Maybe Something More
by Birchwood29
Summary: Ginny's daughter is headed off to Hogwarts just eleven years after the war ended. What happens when she comes into contact with the father she never knew?
1. The Hogwarts Letter

**_Disclaimer: _**Don't own it. Not mine.

When the letter came that morning, Ginny had been sitting at the table reading her paper and sipping on her tea. She should have expected the letter to arrive today, she should have remembered that the one thing she feared was rapidly approaching and there was no stopping it. But she didn't.

The owl landed outside the kitchen window and give a disgruntled hoot at the closed window it found. Ginny's head snapped up and she gaped at the owl, the realization of what it held made her sick to her stomach. She got up quickly and strode over to the window in three easy steps. As she unlatched the hook and threw the windows open, the warm summer heat slowly trickled into the kitchen.

"Give me that," Ginny snapped, a bit disgruntled as she snatched the letter off the angry owl's leg. He gave an angry screech and took off, his wings billowing out on the sides of him as he slowly became a small spec in the horizon. "What," Ginny muttered to herself, "am I going to do with you?"

She thought about throwing the letter away. She thought about tearing it into a million pieces and tossing them right back out the window. She thought about writing a polite yet firm letter to Headmistress McGonagall telling her thanks but no thanks. Finally, she thought about just telling her. Telling her daughter that her Hogwarts letter arrived, she was going to school.

"Mum?" Ginny's daughter called from up the stairs. "Have you seen my pink skirt? The one with the sequins along the bottom?"

"Check your third drawer," Ginny called back, her voice staying calm despite her nerves that began to rattle with every minute the letter sat in her hand.

"Got it! Thanks, mum!"

"When you're done up there, I need to talk to you for a minute," Ginny called, sitting back down at the table and trying desperately to put a speech together.

"Kay."

In the three minutes that it took Ginny's daughter to make it down the stairs, Ginny had turned from the cool, calm and collected person that she usually managed to stay, to a mess who had began biting her nails again. Suddenly footsteps began to echo as a young girl of eleven emerged from the top floor.

After the war Harry Potter needed to find himself. He returned home briefly, two maybe three days. Then he left again, an act that rattled Ginny to her core. It was in that minute when he failed to return that she realized their relationship was actually over and that it maybe should have never begun. She trained herself to forget their little fling back in fifth year never happened. Harder to forget was the life growing within her, the one that she failed to tell Harry. The one she kept a secret.

Harry didn't know she had his child and she quite liked it that way. Hermione told her she was crazy to keep something like this from him, it was his baby, didn't she know that? It was hard to explain, but this baby saved Ginny. It kept her going, kept her busy. She was able to survive Harry's constant rejection and look forward. Without the baby, who knows what she would have done.

Harry was easy to avoid after he finally returned to England. He took a teaching position at Hogwarts and become the new D.A.D.A. teacher. If he visited the Burrow, her mother gave her good enough warning and she stayed put. No one, save for Hermione, knew who the father really was. She had told them that shortly after Harry left, she had dated a wizard in the city and it didn't work out and she decided to keep the baby.

She was actually quite surprised that no one had pieced it together. When Annie was born, she was sure that everyone would take one look at the baby and see only Harry in her. Annie had long, silky black hair that came down just past her shoulder blades. Her eyes weren't quite Ginny's, having too many emerald green speckles in them. She had Harry's nose, Ginny saw it immediately. She had Harry's personality and his laugh. The way she fell asleep any where with her mouth slightly open was Harry. She was left handed like Harry was. Of course, she was also a Weasley. There were a spatter of freckles on the bridge of her nose that you could only see if you got close enough. Her sense of humor was that of the twins and she was loud and very friendly, not brought up to be shy. She was the perfect combination of daughter where she wasn't totally annoying, yet Ginny was glad to have her around as a friend.

"Mum?" Ginny looked up from the letter to see her daughter standing in front of her, one hand crossed across her chest and holding onto the other arm. "You wanted to see me?" Ginny sighed and slid the letter across the table towards her daughter.

"Sit down," Ginny offered, gesturing the chair across from her. "We need to talk."

"Did something happen to grandma and grandpa?" Annie asked quickly.

"No, sweetie, nothing's wrong," Ginny said, managing a small smile, "just sit down." The chair scraped across the wood of the floor as Annie lowered herself into the chair across from her mother. She was staring at the letter in innocent curiosity. "This is a letter informing you that you've been accepted into Hogwarts-" Annie let out a squeal and picked up the envelope. Despite her clenching fear, Ginny felt herself smiling at her daughter's excitement. Annie glanced down at it and sighed with happiness. It read:

**Miss Annie ElizabethWeasley **

**929 Willow Ct. **

**The Room Above the Garden**

**Oxford, England**

Annie glanced up at her mother in excitement. "They even know where my room is!" she said and tore the letter open, unfolding the thick pages and skimming through it.

"Read it to me," Ginny said, holding up her head in one hand as the elbow rested on the table.

"Mum," Annie said, rolling her eyes, "you already know what it says!"

"Humor me," Ginny replied. Annie smiled over at her mother, cleared her throat and began to read from the letter.

"'Dear Miss Weasley, we are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Enclosed is a list of supplies needed for your first year. Term start September 1st and we await your reply no later than July 31st. Sincerely, Professor Lupin, Deputy Headmaster.'" Annie looked up at her mother, wide eyed. "I'm really going to Hogwarts." Ginny managed a nod. "We await your reply no later than July 31st…but that's tomorrow!"

"Then we'd better hurry and reply," Ginny said, taking the paper Annie had handed over to her. She glanced down and signed her name to the page saying that as mother and or legal guardian over her daughter she was going to allow her to attend the school.

"When can we go and get my supplies?" Annie asked anxiously. Ginny glanced up and sighed again.

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes!" Annie said and hopped up. "I'm going to write to Mia."

"Alright," Ginny said and watched her daughter skip away towards the backyard where her owl was sleeping peacefully in her covered pen. She rubbed her hands on her jeans nervously and wondered if Harry would piece it together. Would he be able to spot all the little things they shared?

A pop to Ginny's left made her jump and spill her tea on the floor.

"Hermione!" she cried, placing a hand on her hear and walking over to the sink, dumping the plate into the sink.

"Oh, Ginny! Did you get the letter? I can only imagine what you're feeling!" Hermione cried, bending down to mop up the mess she had made. "Is that it?" she asked, standing up straight and pointing onto the table.

"Yup," Ginny said, staring at it too. "It came fifteen minutes ago."

"What did you do?" Hermione asked.

"Gave it to her, of course!" Ginny said, tossing the soggy napkin into the trash. "I didn't have a choice. She couldn't very well go around her entire life thinking she was a squib and she would have known when the letter was coming…I just worry-"

"Don't," Hermione said. "Your family doesn't even know."

"You know," Ginny reminded her.

"Oh, come on, Ginny! I had to scrape it out of you!" Hermione said, sitting down across the table from Ginny. "Of course, I suspected it. That girl looks so much like her father it's remarkable." Hermione was silent again as Ginny gazed out the window, lost in her thoughts.

"We're going into Diagon Alley tomorrow to get her things…" Ginny commented in an off hand voice.

"Would you like us to go with you?" Hermione asked, playing into Ginny's plan.

"Oh, would you?" Ginny asked, brightening up.

"Of course!" Hermione said, nodding eagerly. Over the years, Ron and Harry and Hermione never lost contact. They got together all the same, they were always at the Burrow at the same time as each other. Although their jobs were both very time consuming and kept them away from each other, they always managed to make it work. For Ginny it was easy to avoid him. He was away at Hogwarts for nine out of twelve months. He had stopped coming home for Christmas a while back, content at staying at Hogwarts and supervising the students. Harry had actually only seen Annie once when she was a baby and he came back. Ginny had passed her off as an ex-boyfriend's child and he asked no more questions.

"I just-" Ginny began and let out a shaky sigh. "I feel as if I did something wrong, sometimes." There was silence from Hermione. "I feel as though I should have told Harry that it was his baby and he could be as involved as possible."

"Ginny, you did the right thing," Hermione said, leaning over and grasping her arm. "We both knew that when Harry came back he was different and wouldn't be able to be there for you in the way you deserved. I think it was better that you kept it from him, I really do. I mean, it isn't as though it's hurting Annie any."

What Hermione and Ginny didn't know was that Annie was desperately hurting. She never understood why her mother would keep such a large secret from her. It wasn't as though she had no right to know, these were half of her genes floating around. Her cousin Mia said that maybe her father was a muggle and maybe her mother was embarrassed. Annie didn't believe that. She didn't believe her father was a muggle. She knew he had to be a wizard, just who she had no idea. Sometimes she became so frustrated with her mother because it was such an annoying and embarrassing thing not to even know who your own father is. Everyone else she knew knew who their father's were. But, NOOO not her.

When Annie was born and Ginny was lying in bed, nursing her, Hermione had come in with a giant basket of fruit and chocolate. She looked down at the baby and gasped, too shocked to speak. Ginny didn't even fight it and just nodded as Hermione desperately fought for words.

"When?" Hermione finally managed, looking down at the baby's giant green/brown eyes.

"I think about two days before he left he was just so scared and so sad that I felt bad for him and I…well, you know," Ginny said, looking down at the baby with a painful sense of love. "Then he left and I found out I was pregnant. I pieced it together and realized it must have been him seeing as he was the only one I ever slept with."

"But are you going to tell him?" Hermione asked, placing a hand on her own rapidly expanding belly.

"No," Ginny replied and Hermione's eyes widened with anger.

"Ginny! This is his baby!" Hermione cried.

"And where is he?" Ginny shouted, tears pricking her eyes. "Did he write to me? Did he ever come back to me? No! I am not going to barge back into his life and tell him that on his already expanding list of shit he has to do, he also has a child to worry about. He's better off not knowing that he has a baby and I don't care if he has a 'right to know' or not. This is mine and only mine to worry about. I will do what I think is best and right at the moment I think keeping and raising the baby on my own is what I want to do."

"Ok," Hermione said, after a long pause. "Ok, I'll keep your little secret."

"Thank you," Ginny said, peering down at the baby. "What should I name her?"

Now, eleven years later Ginny was faced with another tug of fear. She had always worried someone in her family would look over at Annie and see it. See Harry's smile, or his laugh. See the way he held himself in the way Annie did. Maybe they had found out and everyone decided not to say anything. Maybe everyone was just as good of a secret keeper as Ginny was herself.

A/N Please read and review.


	2. The Book Store

**_Dislaimer:_** Don't own it. Not mine.

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**The Next Day**

Annie had woken Ginny up at eight, already dressed and ready to go. She huffed about impatiently as Ginny made herself breakfast, gathered her things and waited for Hermione to get to the house.

"What is taking them so long?" Annie complained as the clock struck eleven in the morning. Ginny sighed and glanced down at her watch.

"I have no idea," she replied and heard the fire begin to roar. "I think that's them…" The fire turned a familiar green and spit out two towering figures as it slowly began to calm down. Annie saw her older cousin, Nathan, who was fourteen, brushing off his shoulders. Next to him was her uncle Ron, also brushing the soot off of his clothes.

"Where's Mia?" Annie blurted, unable to keep the disappointment and frustration out of her voice. She had been up for hours simply waiting to go to Diagon Alley and then waiting another couple of hours just for her aunt and cousin to get here and they don't even show up!

"They're coming," Nathan said, getting the soot out of his red hair. He growled in frustration as it spilled into his eyes. "Mia held mum up this morning when she went looking for her boots and couldn't find them. There, soot free." The fire gave a loud bang and Mia and Hermione tumbled out, slightly covered in soot the brunt of it flying onto Nathan.

"Ready?" Hermione asked, wiping her hair out. "Nathan! What on earth has gotten into you? You knew we were going out today and you're dirtying yourself up!" Nathan turned to his father in anger only to be met with a bad attempt for Ron to stifle his smile. "And you Ron! Letting him muss himself up," Hermione scolded. Nathan gave Ron a sarcastic smirk.

"Can we please go?" Annie pleaded, turning to her mother already angry at her. If they had just been able to go alone they would have already been there shopping.

"Yes," Ginny said, holding onto Annie's hand and leading her into the fireplace. "Do you know where you're going?"

"Yes, mum," Annie said, rolling her eyes. She took a handful of floo, cleared her throat and said clearly: "Diagon Alley." With a bang, she was yanked from the fireplace, her elbow smacking against the wall of the fireplace. She slid out into the Leaky Cauldron with smooth agility and picked herself up. She then waited impatiently for her mother who arrived with a pop at her side.

"Hermione and Ron are going to walk around a bit with Mia and Nathan. I'm gonna let you roam around with me? Deal?" Ginny asked her, opening her purse and glancing down at the money. "Luckily for you, I brought enough Wizarding money with me." Annie sighed with relief and now walked with her mother down the crowded streets. Their first stop was the wand shop. Annie slowly walked into the tiny shop, her excitement coming to a halt as it was replaced with apprehension. She glanced around at her dank and dreary surroundings that she began to worry. According to her cousin Nathan, who in her opinion knew everything, Mr. Olivander had been returned to his shop when Voldemort was through with him even crazier then before. Nathan said that he saw things no man should see, as did Harry Potter. The Harry Potter.

"Well, hello there," a misty voice said from behind a shelf. A man with silvery hair ambled into view, his face knaut and pale. He glanced first at Ginny giving her a small nod. "Ten inches, cherry wood with…a unicorn hair…wasn't it?"

"Y-yes," Ginny said, finding her voice.

"Took eight men to get that female down," Olivander went on vaguely. "I could have told them all they would have needed was a female…" He glanced past Ginny and down at Annie. His eyes widened slightly and his head snapped up to Ginny. Her throat closed as she realized he knew. She shook her head violently waiting for him to say something. Without missing a beat, Mr. Olivander glanced back down at Annie with a smile. "First year?"

"Yes," Annie replied feebly. She was still slightly afraid of this man in front of her. He wasn't exactly giving off good vibes.

"Come forward and let me measure your arms," Olivander said, extracting a tape measure out of thin air and running it up along her arm. "Which would be your wand arm, Miss?"

"Uh…my left hand, I suppose," Annie replied and felt him nod beside her as he went behind the counter. She glanced at her mother as they shared a look. Olivander returned minutes later with a long thin box in his hands. He extended it to her.

"Eleven inches, holly and willow leaf," he said watching as she went to wave it. Suddenly he snatched it back from her and snapped: "No!" Annie jumped slightly and watched him go towards the back of the shop again. He came back moments later with three more boxes. He offered each of them to her with baited breaths. After an encouraging nod from her mother she waved her hand again only to have the wand being snatched out of her hand again.

After twenty three more wands were not for Annie, she began to get very frightened. Maybe she wouldn't find a wand! Maybe her mother would turn to her with a sigh and say that she wasn't fit for Hogwarts and she should continue at muggle school.

"Here we are," Olivander returned now. "Eleven inches, maple, unicorn hair and-" Olivander stopped speaking and just peered hard at Annie. "The phoenix that this feather was taken from was told to have only given two feathers. However, we came back to get another feather about fifteen years ago when He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was rising again…The same phoenix that gave You-Know-Who his feather…and Harry Potter."

Ginny didn't realized that she had let out a moan of slight panic until Annie and Olivander turned to her, their eyes wide, Annie's only with concern.

"Are you alright, mum?" Annie asked, worriedly.

"Yes," Ginny replied. "Too much excitement I think."

"Try it," Olivander prompted Annie. She turned back to the man across from her and bit her lip. With a slight wave of her wand she swished the wand through the air. It happened instantly. A warm sensation seeped from a pit in the bottom of her stomach up her body and across her arms through her fingers into the wand. A crackle of fire came from the tip of it as Annie jumped with shock. "I guess we have our wand."

"I guess so," Ginny whispered softly to herself. She had Annie's sweatshirt folded over her arms as she stood in back of her.  
"Very curious…" Olivander muttered once before retreating back behind the counter and pulling the handle of a giant, ancient cash register. "That'll be twelve galleons." Ginny jumped and her eyes focused back onto the room. They had gone fuzzy with memory.

"Oh! Oh, right," she said and fumbled through her purse until she came across her money. With shaking hands she gave the money to Olivander who met her eye contact with unwavering eyes.

"Good day, Miss Weasley," he replied softly. "And little Miss Weasley."

"Good day," Ginny and Annie said at the same time and left the shop, both shaken for different reasons.

"He was weird," Annie said, scrunching up her nose as they quickly went through the crowded streets. She didn't really know what Olivander had said meant. If she had known that her father was Harry Potter she may have been excited or curious. Ginny was upset by the fact that she had a part of her father in her wand. Even more, she had a part of Voldemort in her wand, which was to be expected. Voldemort was now in Harry's blood and Annie was apart of that.

"Yes, yes he was," Ginny agreed as they came outside the book shop. "Why don't you go in and I'll meet you in there in a moment. I need some fresh air."

"Ok," Annie replied, glancing at her mother for a moment. "Are you sure you're alright? You're pale…and kind of sweating…also almost a bit green-"

"Oh, just go!" Ginny snapped and put a self conscious hand to her face. Annie giggled and extracted her list from her pocket. She knew what she had to get. "Wait!" Ginny said and handed her some money from her bag. "In case you get tired waiting for me. There's some extra in case you see anything you might like."

"Thanks, mum!" Annie said and stepped into the shop. It was only slightly crowded as everyone seemed be further down the street at the Quidditch shop or the Apothecary. Annie picked the right time to come into the book store.

She made her way around and shop, a basket hanging off her arm as she piled it high with the books she might like. Just as she made her way towards the back of the shop, she spotted the book she had been looking for. _Hogwarts, A History: 100 B.C.-2010 A.D. _The volume was thick and weighed almost thirty pounds in her hands.

"Wow," she whispered, her eyes taking in the sight of it. She ran her hands over the cover of it and smiled thinking that her mother had given her just enough to purchase it. She lugged it into the cradle of her arm and made her way further back in the shop. She placed her things down on the floor and pulled a book down from the shelf. A pair of emerald green eyes, that unbeknownst to her matched the mysterious speckles in hers, met hers. She let out a yelp and stepped back as did the man on the other side of the shelf. Annie quickly gathered her things and ran out of the aisle.

She had just seen Harry Potter face to face. She couldn't wait to tell her mother that Ginny's old boyfriend was standing in the shop right now as though he was just any old wizard. Annie turned around and saw Harry Potter picking up the books he had dropped when the young girl startled him. She quickly walked up to the counter and paid for her things and exited the shop.

If Harry had turned around and saw Annie walking out of the store towards Ginny, he may have been able to put it together. If he had really taken a good look at her, he would have seen that some of the things Annie couldn't place on her mother, were on the face in front of her. If Harry had stopped and looked at Annie, he would have seen his nose and some of his eyes on her face. He would have seen his black hair handing loosely around her shoulders. If he had looked closely he would have seen his daughter walk away from him.

A/N Please read and review. Also, just so no one thinks this: Annie won't have to face Voldemort or anything, I don't know if that may be what some people may get from that, but it isn't what I intended. Thank you.


	3. The Meeting in the Leaky Cauldron

**_Disclaimer-_** I don't own anything. Not Mine.

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As Harry Potter stepped out of the book shop he shifted the packages in his arms he couldn't help looking over his shoulder every few moments. He felt as though he had missed something crucial or had somehow forgotten something back in the shop. He made his way over to a table and patted down his pockets quickly, checking that he still had his wallet tucked carefully in the sewn in pocket.

He slowly gathered his things and continued on his way to meet the Weasley's for their annual belated birthday lunch with Harry. He entered the Leaky Cauldron and sat towards the back waiting for Ron, Hermione and the kids to arrive. His stomach gave an impatient rumble as he drummed his fingers along the glass tabletop.

The bell over the door gave a merry jingle as it opened. Harry looked over at it and felt his entire body size up with what felt like an electric shock. Ginny Weasley stepped into the dim room, her arms burdened by packages stuffed with goods. Instinctively, Harry stood up and went over to her. She turned around and looked into his eyes, her own widening with panic.

"Harry," she said simply, the shock seeping from her body into her words.

"Ginny," Harry said, scratching his head awkwardly. "How are you? I really haven't seen you since-"

"Yes, well, I'm doing alright," Ginny said briskly.

"I heard you had a baby," Harry offered.

"I did," Ginny croaked, feeling her heart begin to pound uncontrollably against her ribcage. Any moment Annie was going to walk into the room and Harry would be able to see it. With the three of them together, it was hard to not see it. Whatever Annie hadn't gotten directly from Ginny she had gotten from Harry and unluckily enough, Harry's were all exterior.

"Well, er, congratulations," Harry said, a dull flush creeping onto his cheeks.

"Thank you," Ginny said, sliding backwards. "I really must get going, though. I promised I'd meet Hermione and Ron by the wand shop-"

"Well, we're meeting here, why don't you-"

"Oh, you know what? I remembered I needed to get something for mum, so I best get going," Ginny rambled, nearly tripping over a chair in her attempt to leave as soon as possible. "Bye, Harry."

"Ginny-" Harry tried but she had turned away and ran out of the pub, her bags swinging merrily at her side. Harry felt his heart sink slightly and rubbed his forehead painfully as he took his glasses off of his face. The bell once again went off as new voices filled the empty pub.

"-well, honestly!" Hermione cried, throwing her bags onto a chair. "You bought him a new broom?"

"Don't worry about it," Ron persisted. "It has all sorts of cool things built into it," Ron explained, taking it out to show her. She still had a frown on her face.

"I don't care if it has a gold plated-Well…actually, that's quite nice really," she said, rubbing her hand over it. "Did you already show it to him?"

"Nope, saving it for his birthday," Ron said. "Speaking of birthdays." They both turned to Harry with smiles on their faces. "Happy 32nd!"

"Shh," Harry snapped and moodily sat down to his butterbeer. "Stop shouting my age, will you?"

"A bit touchy, are we?" Hermione teased setting her coat down beside her purse. "What chip happens to be on your shoulder this wonderful afternoon?"

"You're not still worried about that gray hair I pulled out of your head the other day, are you?" Ron asked.

"What gray hair?" Harry asked anxiously, his head flying to his head and feeling around.

"Never mind," Ron went on quickly. "Back to the chip."

"I don't have a chip," Harry snapped, still glaring suspiciously at Ron.

"Then tell aunt Hermione what happened," Hermione said, touching his shoulder. She picked some nuts out of the bowl and popped them into her mouth.

"I saw Ginny," Harry said. "She came into the pub." Hermione began to choke on her peanuts and turned a violent shade of red. "Are you alright?" Harry cried, pounding her on the back. She didn't answer.

"That must have been awkward," Ron commented.  
"It wasn't until she ran out of here," Harry said, his face returning to its blushing red as he remembered it. "She said she was meeting you guys over by the wand shop and then when I said I was meeting you here, she made up some excuse about getting something for her mother. She then literally ran out of here."

"Well that was rude of her," Ron said, shaking his head. "She was probably late picking Annie up, though."

"Who?" Harry asked, sipping on his butterbeer.

"Her daughter," Ron said. Harry began coughing despite himself. Sure, he knew she had a daughter with some ex-boyfriend named Jake something or other. Or maybe it was Jack. Or Sam. Hermione had been pretty vague about the name of the sperm donor. Also, it was almost an unspoken rule in the Burrow that no one asked and or spoke of Annie's father. At least when Harry had been there that was how it was. Harry actually hadn't gotten the chance to meet her but he had seen a picture of it. Ginny was standing in front of the little girl whenever he had tried to look at it, as though shielding her from view.

"How old is her daughter?" Harry croaked as Hermione pounded him in the back, her own coughing going down.

"So you haven't seen her?" Hermione asked quickly.

"No," Harry said shaking his head.

"Annie's eleven…yeah, starting her first year," Ron said pointing out his order to Tom who had come over. "Medium rare, thanks, Tom."

"Wow…" Harry said, truly dumbfounded not for the first time today. "What does she look like?" He didn't know why he was so interested.

"Black hair, about 5'2, green eyes-" Ron began when Hermione cut him off sharply.

"They're brown, like Ginny's," she said quickly.

"No…no, they're green," Ron said.

"They're brown, Ronald," Hermione barked.

"I think they're green."

"Well, I think they're brown," Hermione snarled, her voice taking on a deathly silence, quite like Snape's only more dangerous. While kids knew Snape couldn't exactly pull out his wand and hex the living crap out of you, Hermione could and would if provoked.

"Let's go get her," Ron countered.

"I don't think that's a good idea, Ron," Hermione snapped, kicking Ron hard in the shin.

"Ouch!" Ron cried, rubbing the smarting skin. "Alright, they're brown, jeez!" Hermione looked back down at her drink. As soon as she looked away, Ron turned to Harry and mouthed: "They're green." Harry smiled a sad sort of smile and looked down at his hands.

OoOoOoOoOo

Annie had met her mother outside of the Leaky Cauldron. She was just about to pull the door open when Ginny had come barreling out of the pub, looking white and shaken.

"Where do you think you're going?" Ginny demanded.

"To meet you for lunch," Annie said, gesturing to the back of Ginny. "You said one, right? Oh, am I late? I'm sorry. There was such a large line at the potions shop and they ran out of levels and I had to wait for another one-"

"No, it's fine," Ginny said, a bright smile coming on her face.

"Ok…I'm famished," Annie said, going to open the door again.

"No!" Ginny screamed. People turned to look at them as she tried to clasp onto her composure. "Let's go to the-"

"What's going on, mum?" Annie asked, looking at her mother with worry. Ginny felt her throat close again as she thought that only twenty feet from where they stood Harry was sitting; Annie's father.

"Nothing, dear," Ginny said, laughing shrilly. "I'm fine!"

"Then why can't we go in and eat?" Annie asked.

"Let's go get a kitten!" Ginny cried suddenly. Annie's eyes brightened and she let out a whoop.

"Really?" she said, excitement coursing through her. She wasn't stupid, she knew her mother didn't want her in that pub for a reason, one she didn't know of. However, she had been begging for a kitten since she was born, unable to get one for some unknown reason. She figured she should get the kitten and pry whatever secret her mother was trying to hide out of her later.

"Sure!" Ginny said. "Two even!" Annie nearly lost her footing.

"What's gotten into you?" Annie snapped as Ginny pushed her along the streets towards the pet shop. Ginny couldn't reply. Her heart was beating too fast for her to say anything. Her throat was making it hard for her to swallow.

The door to the pet shop opened with a creak as the animals inside added to the noise and began to screech, meow and sniff all at once. The lady behind the counter looked up from her magazine and gave a vague wave to say that they were free to look around.

Annie glanced along the cages, keeping one eye on the sleeping kittens and another on her mother who was staring out the window towards the street they had just come up. She was about to say something when a cat caught her eye.

It was a chubby little kitten with sleek black fur and a white stomach and matching white boots. It had large blue eyes that focused right onto Annie's and it meowed loudly.

"Mum," Annie called, turning back to her mother who jumped and came over to see which one she had chosen. "I like this one."

"You're sure?" Ginny asked, trying to stall for time.

"Yes," Annie said firmly. "I like her."

"Ok…" Ginny said reluctantly. She pointed to the kitten as the woman came out from behind the counter with a small box with holes in it.

As they paid, Ginny felt a nervous crunch in her stomach. She didn't know how she was going to get Annie home without going back into the pub where Harry sat with Ron and Hermione. What if he saw her and said something? A long time ago Ginny had explained the entire father situation to Annie who had understood it as much as she could. But what would her daughter say when she found out that her father wasn't a deadbeat, immature boy who ran as soon as he found out his girlfriend was pregnant. What if she found out that her mother, the woman she trusted with her life, lied to her her entire life, making her hate her own father for something he didn't do? What if Annie found out that Ginny never even told Harry and that he may have been willing to make them a family…maybe.

"Mum?" Annie asked, waving a hand in front of Ginny. They had walked the length of the street easily enough and was now back near the Leaky Cauldron. "Ready to go?"

"Let's walk! It's a nice day," Ginny pleaded.

"Mum! We live three hundred miles away!" Annie cried. "Let's just floo."

"Let's take a cab-"

"You hate all things muggle and it'll take too long, mum," Annie snapped, now becoming angry. "Let's floo like the rest of the Wizarding world."

"Want to learn how to Apparate?" Ginny asked as a last ditch attempt.

"No," Annie said, her voice and face showing she was no longer amused by her mother.

"Fine!" Ginny snapped and slowly looked into the windows. "You just STAY here, do you understand me? I do not want you to move."

"Jeez, just buy me a leash and tie me to a meter why don't you?" Annie complained. Her mother glared at her. "I get it, don't move!"

"Ok," Ginny said, sliding back slightly. "I'll be right back."

Annie watched her mother go into the pub and rolled her eyes. Something was up and Annie hated being out of the loop. Her mother never, ever kept anything from her. They had an open relationship and up until now Annie thought that she knew all of her mother's dirty laundry. Up until now. Sure, there were some things that didn't add up. Her father for instance. The last time she asked about her father, the vase in her mother's hands ended up on the floor and they had gotten into a disastrous fight. Although Annie knew her father was someone she may never know, she still wanted to see him at least once. And she wanted him to see her at least once.

OoOoOoOoOo

Harry Potter had been standing across the street from the Leaky Cauldron for an entire minute now. He was waiting for Ginny to come back. He wanted to talk to her, just to try and revive their friendship. When he got there a girl with silky black hair was standing outside of the pub, a box in her hands. She looked familiar as though he had seen her before.

_The bookstore, _his mind drilled at him. He nodded to himself, shoving his hands in his pockets. _That's it._

None the less, he frowned and studied her face. She seemed very familiar as though he had always known her. She looked like someone he knew, he couldn't place the face however.

"Uncle Harry, are you ready?" a tiny voice called. Harry looked down at Ron and Hermione's youngest daughter,Lucy,who had just turned five last month.

"Yeah," Harry replied. "Let's go." He took her hand and walked her down the street, giving the girl on the corner one last look before he turned into the candy shop.

What Annie didn't know was that her father had seen her and she had seen him dozens of times. In fact, he was in every picture in Ron and Hermione's house.

A/N Please read and review.


	4. The Sorting

**_Disclaimer-_** I don't own it. Not Mine.

* * *

**September 1st**

"Oh, we're going to miss it!" Ginny cried as they ran into the station, Annie's trunk tagging along behind them as she ran along side her mother.

"Mum, it's alright! I pushed the clocks ahead a half an hour," Annie said, trying to sooth the stitch in her chest. She had anticipated traffic and maybe further delays from her mother as she was constantly prone to do lately. Especially if they went anywhere a wizard might be.

"Annie Elizabeth! How dare you!" Ginny snapped, setting the bag down and leaning up against the wall trying to catch her breath. "I just ran a hundred meters trying to make the train and you've known all along that you weren't going to miss it?"

"Mum, even when you thought we were late you wanted to stop at a gift shop and pick me up a Oxford University hat," Annie snapped. "You don't even work there nor has anyone gone there."

"Oh, shush up," Ginny muttered and patted down her hair. She could now breath easily without a ripping pain in her chest. "Let's get going, shall we?"

"Yes, please," Annie said, took her mothers hand as they crossed the crowded station.

"On the count of three," Ginny muttered softly into Annie's ear. "One…Two-" They tumbled back and nearly fell over in shock.

"I thought you said three!" Annie cried, giggling. Ginny let out a snort and righted herself straight.

"I forgot it wasn't solid!" she said, still laughing. "Hurry up now, you don't want to get stuck with the weirdo's in the back."

"Will do," Annie said and turned to her mother who suddenly looked pained. "I love you mum."

"I love you too, kid," Ginny said, smoothing down Annie's hair. She looked into the big brown/green eyes of her daughter and swallowed once. "I want you to promise me something."

"Alright…" Annie said apprehensively.

"If you hear anything or maybe something that wasn't quite what you thought it might be, just…come to me first…ok?" Ginny asked, holding onto Annie's hands in hers.

"Huh?" Annie asked as the train's whistle blared. She wanted to step back from her mother and hop on the train so that she wouldn't promise her mother something she couldn't keep.

"Just come to me if you hear something that maybe upsets you…me not anyone else…or at least me first," Ginny said.

"Ok," Annie said with a shrug. "Promise."

"Good girl," Ginny whispered. The train let out another warning and they both jumped. Ginny burst into tears and hugged onto Annie.

"_Mum!_" Annie cried in embarrassment and shock but still held onto her all the same. "I'll be good and I won't get into any trouble. I'll have straight O's and I'll write every weekend!"

"You better!" Ginny said and kissed Annie's head. "Good bye, love!"

"Bye, mum," Annie said and stepped nervously onto a compartment. Her cousins who were older than her said she was welcome with them if she couldn't find any place better but she didn't want to use that just yet. She held onto her clutch bag that her mother had given to her in one hand and in the other she held her kitten, Bailey.

Finally she came to an empty compartment and slid into it just as the train gave a slight jolt of movement. She swallowed nervously and set her things down on chair. Bailey meowed loudly and ran her paw along the cage.

"In a moment, Bailey," Annie reassured her cat who retreated to the back of the cage in a pout. "I'm sorry! I don't know if someone will come in and not like you-"

"I hope there's a cat in that cage," someone said from the doorway. Annie snapped her head up and saw a girl with long, sandy brown hair. She had great grey/blue eyes that shown in the late morning sunlight.

"Of course there is," Annie said, color rushing to her cheeks. The girl smiled and moved further into the compartment.

"May I sit here?" she asked, gesturing to the seat across from Annie. "My brothers had me carrying their pets while they lugged around their trunks and let me tell you that Elliot's owl is either pregnant or borderline obese because she weighed about twenty-seven pounds. My name is Marley, Marley Lupin."

"Hi, I'm Annie Weasley," Annie replied. Marley's eyes widened slightly.

"Weasley as in the Weasley family?" she asked, her mouth dropping open.

"There's a 'the' in front of our name?" Annie asked awkwardly. She had only heard people say 'the' in front of important things such as 'The Harry Potter' or 'The Dark Lord' or 'New Italian Boots I Found On Sale Last Week and Had To Have.'

"Your family helped defeat the Dark Lord didn't it?" Marley asked, now interestingly pulling on her hair.

"Well…I guess…isn't your dad in the Order?" Annie asked, trying to shift attention off of herself. "I mean and isn't he the Transfiguration teacher, also?"

"Yes, yes," Marley said, waving her hand in a dismissive move. "You look familiar…have we met before?" Annie shook her head once as Marley skipped down memory lane trying to place that face with the name. In fact, though it was on the tip of her tongue and she didn't know it, she thought Annie looked quite a bit like her god father, Harry Potter.

"I like your shoes," Annie said. Marley looked down and then smiled.

"I made them, you really like them?" she asked doubtfully. "My brother Jonathan said they looked as if the cat puked on them and I was too lazy to clean them up."

"That's rude," Annie commented.

"No, it's brothers," Marley replied and they both burst into giggles. "So what about you? Any siblings?"

"No," Annie said, shaking her head. "Just me and my mom."

"How old is your mom?" Marley asked with interest.

"Thirty-one," Annie replied as Marley smiled.

"My mother is forty-one," she said matter-of-factly. "What about your dad? How old is he?"

It happened again. Annie felt her throat close with embarrassment and the color rise automatically to her cheeks as she glanced over at Marley. She was going to have to tell the whole story for her to understand and it always made it so much worse. Of course, Marley had no idea that Annie didn't know her father, but it was still annoying to have to tell the story over and over again.

"I don't know," Annie replied. "I've never met him. He left me and my mum before I was born."  
"Oh," Marley said, blushing. "I'm sorry, I didn't know-"

"Don't apologize," Annie cut in quickly before things got awkward. "You can't miss something you don't have, right?" Marley looked at her doubtfully so Annie went on. "I mean if you were born blind you couldn't miss not seeing anything because it's just the way it is for you. I've never had a father so I don't miss him not being in my life. Plus, my mother is parent enough to be both." Annie had just lied to this girl who could potentially be her best friend. In fact, she missed a father very much just because Mia and Nathan and Lucy seemed to really love theirs and sometimes Ginny seemed so sad that her father must be the only one to cheer her up.

"If it helps I never really saw much of my father either," Marley said. Annie looked over at her. "He's the school's Deputy Headmaster which means he lives at school and we see him on weekends if we're lucky."

"I'm sorry," Annie replied. "Maybe it's worse for you? Do you think?"

"You seem really smart…are you?" Marley asked.

"I hope so," Annie replied and they laughed again. Just then the door slid open and someone poked their head into the compartment where Annie and Marley sat.

"Oh, I'm sorry I didn't mean to-" she began.

"No," Annie said. "Come in and sit down."

"Oh…er, alright," the girl said coming in and sitting across from them. "I'm Alice…Alice Longbottom."

"Hello, I'm Annie Weasley and this is Marley Lupin," Annie said.

"Pleasure," Marley said, sticking out her hand to shake it with Alice who was slowly unwinding and coming out of her shell. By the time the train pulled into the station, the girls were best friends.

OoOoOoOoOo

"Let's just get this over with," Snape muttered, drumming his hands along the table top. Harry turned to him and the back to the doors which weren't opening yet.

"You act like this every year," Harry complained. "Don't you understand enough to eat before the feast so no one has to be in fear of your temper for an hour and a quarter?" Before Snape could reply, Lupin cut in and engaged Harry in a conversation cutting off Snape and Harry's annual bicker match that lasted just until the doors flew open. "Is Marley starting school this year?"

"Yes," Lupin said, looking slightly anxious. "I'm a bit worried if I must be honest."

"Why?" Harry asked, nibbling on some breadsticks. "She seems to have a good head on her shoulders-"

"No, she's bright alright," Lupin cut in, "I'm just worried the boys left her at the train station. It wouldn't be the first time they forgot her somewhere." Harry shook his head.

"They wouldn't do that," he comforted.

"Maybe not on purpose," Lupin muttered and sat back in his chair. Noise was coming out from behind the doors as students piled into the room. Snape looked at his watch and rolled his eyes.

"That's my cue," he said and got up and walked over to the doors to throw them open. "Everyone in and keep quiet!" Snape shouted as everyone piled in, too afraid to speak. Once they got to their tables the chatter began again as Snape disappeared around the corner to fetch the first years. Moments later Snape reappeared with a group of frightened looking students. Harry couldn't blame them AT ALL. If Snape had fetched them in his first year he would have turned around and run back to the boat and paddled back to Surrey.

McGonagall shifted in her seat and peered over her glasses at the students coming in around the stool with the hat. Lupin scanned the heads and gave a sigh of relief as he saw his daughters sandy head standing next to a girl with black hair and another girl with light brown hair.

Snape shook out the parchment and began to call out the names of different students who all approached the bench looking slightly apprehensive. Snape had been cleared of all charges when sufficient evidence came out that Snape was double-double crossing and had been on their side the entire time. Dumbledore planned his own death and blackmailed Snape into doing it for him.

"Longbottom, Alice," Snape called and a timid girl with brown hair came up to the hat and perched herself upon it. The hat sat on her head. Harry peered over the table to watch her and couldn't help see all the similarities between both Neville and Luna.

"GRYFFINDOR!" the hat cried as Alice gratefully slid off the chair and ran to the table to sit down. Snape looked down the list, his eyes going up to Lupin's for a mere second before looking back down.

"Lupin, Marley," he called and Marley slowly came forward and perched herself upon the stool, her face looking more worried then it did moments before. She bit her lips as the hat spoke softly into her air. Finally it seemed to nod.

"GRYFFINDOR!" it shouted. Marley slid off the seat, glanced up at the high table and smiled at her father and godfather before sitting down at the Gryffindor table next to Alice.

"Now it's up to Annie," Marley whispered to Alice who in turn nodded worriedly and stared at the dwindling crowd.

"Knock on wood," Alice said suddenly.

"What?" Marley hissed.

"Oh, just do it," Alice said and they both knocked onto the wood.

Finally it was just down to Annie and one other boy who seemed to know where he was going already. Ravenclaw.

"Weasley, Annie," Snape called, in spite of himself looking up at her. Harry had stopped breathing as he saw the girl walk across the floor to the stool. This must be Ginny's daughter. She perched herself upon it and lost sight of all the other tables.

"Hmm," the hat hissed in her ear. "Little Annie Weasley…where shall we put you? Yet another Weasley to the overly expanding Gryffindor population…maybe…oh, but your family isn't all Weasley…oh, no….there was your father of course." Annie felt her heart begin to beat wildly. "I think that's it. Better be-GRYFFINDOR!" Annie felt disappointment at not finding out her father's name, and sudden giddiness as she collapsed next to her friends.

Through out the entire dinner Annie had a feeling that someone was staring at her. Halfway through dinner she glanced up at the high table and saw Harry Potter, THE Harry Potter, looking at her curiously. She gave him a small smile and looked back down at her plate.

Lupin, who had been sitting at the table watched Harry looking at Annie Weasley and felt himself grow weak. If you looked hard enough and knew what to look for…you could swear that that girl was the spitting image of Harry Potter…and suddenly Remus Lupin got it.

A/N Please read and review.

**Next…First Day, Will Remus tell Harry, How will Harry and Annie get along? **


	5. The News

**_Disclaimer-_** Don't own it. Not Mine.

* * *

Nymphadora Lupin was sitting in her den waiting for her husband to return home from the feast. She could have gone up to the Great Hall and eaten next to her husband as she was apt to do sometimes, however, she felt it best to sit and wait for him. She fixed herself some dinner, probably to be wasted when Remus came back laden with treats, and settled down on the couch, a muggle t.v. blaring BBC.

The door burst open fifteen minutes later and hurried footsteps came barreling into the den. Tonks turned around to stare at her husband of fifteen years in shock.

"You didn't bring me anything?" she asked, pouting.

"You have to come see this," Lupin replied, trying to drag her up to a standing position. He was panting as though he had run the entire length of the castle.

"See what?" Tonks asked, laughing slightly. "Stop tugging on my arm, you're gonna break it."

"At first I couldn't believe it! I mean, Harry would have said something but then as I looked closely, it looked as though he didn't know either!" Lupin rambled, now pacing back and forth. "They look so much a like it's almost as though you can't miss it, but you do. I mean you really have to look for everything because she's a Weasley and looks a lot like her mother but then you look back and she looks more like her father then anything! You really have to look for it though."

"Remus!" Tonks cried, trying to get him to stop.

"I mean, do you think he knows? Wouldn't he say something to me?" Lupin babbled on.

"Remus Lupin!" Tonks shouted. He stopped and turned to her. "Darling, you're babbling, calm down and tell me what's the matter. Slowly."

"Harry Potter has a daughter," Lupin said. There was silence from Tonks as she took in the information. Finally she shook her head twice.

"No he doesn't," she said, folding her arms.

"Yes, he does! You just need to take one look at this girl to know that he's her father," Lupin said. "You have to _really _look for it though because if you don't then it's very easy to miss-"

"Remus, Harry doesn't have a daughter and you sound very crazy right now," Tonks said in a soothing voice. She rubbed his arms as he gave a disgruntled noise.

"Then come look," Lupin pleaded. "I promise you that if you look hard enough then you can see it! She looks so much like Lily and a lot like Ginny and Harry-"

"Ginny? What does Ginny have to do with this?" Tonks cut in.

"Annie Weasley is Ginny's daughter…Harry left nine months before Annie was born. He wouldn't have even known if she didn't tell him," Lupin said, slowly piecing it together.

"You think the Weasley's would let her get away with that?" Tonks asked skeptically.

"Unless…" Lupin said, sputtering off as he fought for a reason.

"She didn't tell them either," Tonks whispered. She looked back at her husband. "Are you _sure _about this? You thought my cousin Albert was a woman."

"Well, in my defense he is quite feminine," Lupin said and earned himself a punch in the shoulder. "But I'm sure of this!"

"Oh, Remus…I don't know," Tonks said, wringing her hands together. She honestly didn't know what to think of what her husband was saying. It was very easy to just say that he was being foolish and possibly had too much drink in him…There was another part of her that really wanted to believe what he was saying was true.

"Let's go get her! She was with Marley earlier-"

"Our Marley?" Tonks blurted out. Lupin nodded once and Tonks felt something inside of her crumble. "Oh…alright! But this better not turn out to be another one of your stupid tricks, Remus Lupin, or you will be sleeping on the couch until I can't remember why you're there."

"Deal," Lupin said, grabbing her arm and dragging her out of the den and into the hallway. "We'll just casually walk up to Marley and hope that she has Annie with her. I told Marley to meet us after dinner so we could say goodnight." They went out into the main hall and made their way down the hall and down a flight of stairs.

"Remus, stop pulling me! I'm going to fall," Tonks cried as they swung around another corner. Remus didn't answer but slowed down some as they approached the first batch of students.

"Hello professor and Mrs. Lupin," one of them said, waving. Both Remus and Tonks were popular among the students; Remus for being a fair and decent professor and Tonks for being just plain old Tonks.

"Hello," they both replied and saw their daughter standing by a picture of a walrus, her long hair down around her shoulders. Her back was to them as they came nearer. When they were three feet from her, she shifted suddenly and Tonks got a look at a girl with shiny black hair, giant brown eyes with a green shine to them. They caught Tonks's attention immediately, they were hard not to. Annie's eyes were one of her better feature. They were large with thick eyelashes framing them. She wasn't looking directly at them but instead at Marley who was putting on a shoe and talking with her arms spread wide.

"Marley," Lupin said and watched as she flipped around. She smiled at her parents.

"Mum! Dad!" she said, giving them each a hug. "These are my friends Alice and Annie." Tonks couldn't speak for a moment. There was now no denying it. This was Harry's daughter.

Remus had been right in saying that you had to look for Harry's features, they almost seemed to hide from you. It was most definitely his nose on her face and those were his green flecks in her eyes. It was his hair, no doubt. She had his laugh and Ginny's smile.

"H-hello, Annie," Tonks said politely. She seemed to be shy such as Harry was prone to be. A Weasley never shut up that much.

"Hi," she replied and stuck out her hand. Tonks took it was a dazed look on her face and turned to her husband who was looking smugly at her. She felt her smile falter as she glared at her husband but it quickly returned as she turned back to Annie.

"How's your mother?" Tonks asked.

"Usually she's fine but she's probably blubbering away on my aunt Hermione's shoulder as we speak," Annie replied and Tonks was hit with another sense of familiarly as Annie's Weasley came radiating off of her as she got adjusted to the situation.

"Well, you tell her I said hello, alright?" Tonks asked and turned to Alice who was looking very awkward. "You too, tell your parents I said hello."

"Will do," Alice replied.

"We better get going," Lupin said. "You girls need to get to bed. You don't want to keep your prefect's waiting-"

"Oh, it's just my cousins…they can wait a while for me," Annie said with a shrug. "Bye."

"Good-bye," Lupin and Tonks said at the same time. They waited until the girls were out of earshot before turning to each other with stunned looks on their faces.

"Oh my God!" Tonks breathed, leaning against the wall. "She looks just like him! And you do have to look for it, you're right."

"I know," Lupin replied earning yet another glare from his wife. "Do you think Harry knows?"

"I don't think so," Tonks replied. "Her last name is Weasley I think if Harry knew then he and Ginny would be married by now. Unless…they decided against a marriage?"

"No," Lupin said, shaking his head. "He'd tell me."

"How can you be so sure?" Tonks asked skeptically.

"I can't…maybe I should ask him-Ouch!" Tonks had hit him hard in the arm, a incredulous expression on her face.

"Are you stupid?" she hissed. "So help me Merlin if you breathe one word about this to Harry, Remus, so help me!"

"Alright, calm down, woman," Lupin replied. "Why wouldn't she say anything to him, though? It's his baby!"

"Remus, Harry was very messed up when he came back. I think she was right in doing what she did, I mean he wouldn't have been there for her in the way he should have been."

"Oh…maybe you're right…" Lupin said doubtfully. "I have to go to the staff meeting. I'll see you back in the bedroom in an hour?"

"Bring cookies," Tonks said, giving him a quick kiss on the lips.

"Will do." He walked away and left Tonks to simmer in her own thoughts.

"Oh, Ginny," she whispered to herself before turning and following the crowd until she reached her apartment in the far right of the castle.

Lupin hurried to the staff meeting, twenty minutes late as it was Snape was sure to have a fit if he came in so late. He pushed the door open to the office and tried to slide in quietly. Harry looked up at him and Lupin swallowed once, trying with all his might to not shout out: "She's your daughter! That girl, Annie Weasley is your daughter! It's yours and Ginny's! remember when you left? Well, Ginny had a baby and now it's Annie! That's why she won't talk to you!"

Instead he greeted Snape's glare and sneer with a smile and a wave.

"What took you so long?" Harry muttered as McGonagall went on about her business as though nothing had happened. "You're late. I thought Snape was going to have a fit. You know he hates ushering students around and it was your job this time."

"Oh, he'll get over it," Lupin muttered and turned to Harry, his friend and somewhat of a son to him. "So, what do you think about this newest bunch on students?"

"They look the same…nervous and twitchy," Harry replied easily enough. Lupin nodded, somewhat disappointed and turned back to McGonagall who was addressing Quidditch hours. He tried to find a window in which to hop through and discuss Annie some. He promised his wife he wouldn't say anything but this was just something he couldn't keep from him.

"Another Weasley to the bunch…" Lupin said lightly. Harry tensed and turned back Lupin with a sullen expression on his face.

"Yeah, that's Annie…Ginny's daughter," he replied. "She looked familiar, I mean I've never met her but she seemed so familiar like I've always known her…"

"You don't say," Lupin said sarcastically. He wanted to blurt it out and tell Harry and was loosing the battle with every passing moment. It was on the tip of his tongue, begging for release. Instead, he turned back to the group of teachers and said: "There's mold in the fifth floor bathroom."

"Wonderful," Snape replied. "We'll get right on that."

OoOoOoOoOo

Annie followed Marley, who seemed to know where she was going, and Alice past giant portraits and small portraits, past pictures with pictures inside of pictures.

"So those were your parents?" Alice asked, tugging on her hair which seemed to be a nervous habit. Marley nodded once and turned a corner so that they were in back of the first year Gryffindor group. They followed the two prefects, the girl with flaming red hair and the other with sandy brown hair and eyes like Marley's.

"Alright, everyone! Listen up," the Carrie Weasley called across the room. All the first years quieted down and turned to watch her. "Girls dorms are up the stairs to the left, you'll find your baggage in front of a bed, that is yours!"

"Boys same message except to the right," Jonathan Lupin called across the room. "You'll find your things in front of the bed."

"This is the Gryffindor common room," Carrie went on, "you'll spend your free time here and you'll come back here before curfew-"

"-which has been pushed back for nine o'clock this year," Jonathan said. "Carrie and I, such as your other prefects, located by shiny badges-"

"-are here for you. You can always come to us if you need help," Carrie finished. "Any questions? No? good." The student broke apart uneasily and followed each other up the stairs to their rooms. Annie, Marley, and Alice hung back to get a look around despite the drowsiness filtering in.

"Where _were_ you?" a boy hissed angrily. Marley turned to a boy with sandy hair and giant grey eyes. She fixed him an equally angry stare and rolled her eyes.

"As if it's any of your business?" she snapped back. "Keep your large nose out of everyone's business you buck toothed freak."

"Oh, whatever Marley," the boy replied, rolling his eyes. "It's not like I even care. Mum would have my head on a silver platter if I let you get lost." He turned around and left Annie and Alice standing quite awkwardly.

"Um…who was that?" Alice finally asked.

"Who?" Marley asked, as though she had no idea what they were talking about.

"The boy you just talked to," Annie said, pointing at the boy who was standing next to another boy who looked as though he were a year or two older then them. Marley looked around and rolled her eyes.

"My older brother, Elliot," she replied and looked back over at them again. "He's a year older than I am."

"How many brothers do you have?" Annie asked.

"Two," she replied. "My brother Jonathan and my brother Elliot. All older than I am, all have a 'holier than thou' attitude." She turned to Alice. "What about you? How many siblings do you have?"

"Three," Alice replied. "My brother Frank, who I think was named after my grandfather, my sister Nora and then my other brother Michael."

"Hmm," Marley said, tapping her chin. "How do you like younger siblings?"

"They're annoying," Alice replied.

"I find it the same about older ones," Marley said with a shrug. They both turned to Annie who was feeling quite left out. "It must be nice for you. No one to fight with. One time my brother and I were fighting over a doughnut and he elbowed me in the face. Hurt like hell."

"One time my mother wore a shirt with fake breasts on them and my grandmother got so angry that the roast exploded all over the living room walls," Annie said, blushing once it was out of her mouth. "Sometimes my cousins like to see who can catch me fastest."

"And?" Marley asked. Annie smiled.

"No one so far," she replied smugly and led them up the stairs to their rooms. She sighed with happiness as she took in the red velvet hangings and the comfy looking sheets. "Nice," she said to Alice and Marley who nodded in agreement.

OoOoOoOoOo

The next day dawned bright and early for Annie who had trouble sleeping through Josie Wood's snoring and Laurie Thomas's sleep talking. Annie swung her legs out of the bed and slipped her feet into the slippers she got for her last birthday. They were getting very tight; her toes were crammed right up to the edge of the top. Her bathrobe was next to cover her shivering her body as she went over to her trunk and pulled off her nightgown and tugged on her skirt and white button up shirt.

"Alice," Annie called softly, shaking the sleeping girl awake. "Wake up…breakfast is ready." Alice muttered something about ten more minute and placed a pillow over her head with a grunt. "Um…ok." Annie walked over to Marley's bed and tugged the curtains open, blinding the sleeping girl. She let out a cry and dove back under her covers. "We're going to be late for our first day, Marley! Wake up!"

"Get at least a swinging arms distance from me," Marley snarled angrily and placed another pillow on her head as though to close to conversation.

"Oh, come on!" Annie whined and stamped her foot. Alice poked her head out and glared at Annie for a moment before sighing.

"I'm up," she said, "only because I don't want to be late for Snape's class if we have it first thing. I hear he's in a bad mood first thing in the year and his detentions are horrible."

"True," Marley said, waking up now and tugging on her skirt. "Should we get sleeping beauty and her better half up or just let them alone?" She cocked her head over to where Josie and Laurie were still sleeping, hangings shut tightly.

"No, we should wake them," Annie said, biting her lip. She slowly walked over and cleared her throat weakly. "Uh, Laurie?"

"Uh," Laurie replied groggily.

"It's seven twenty-six…" Annie said, turning back to Marley and Alice who shrugged once. "Are you waking up?"

"Yes," Laurie said.

"Oh…ok," Annie said and quickly walked out of the room and into the bathroom as Alice and Marley burst out of giggles. They brushed their teeth and their hair fairly quickly and grabbed their bags from beside their bed.

"Should we bring everything?" Alice asked, holding up a heavy volume of potions. She turned to Annie and Marley with her eyebrows raised. "Will we have time to come back here later?"

"I should think so," Annie said. "Probably after lunch…but, er, just to be safe…I'm taking everything." Marley and Alice looked at each other.

"Us too," they said together. It was almost an unspoken thing that Annie would always know what to do. She seemed to have the most brains of the two of them. While Alice and Marley weren't dumb, they just figured anyone who bought the new history of Hogwarts book had to be smart.

"Oh, we have Potions first thing," Alice said, looking worried again. "My father's told me horror stories about Snape."

"My dad said he's fine as long as you don't get him angry," Marley said, shrugging. Annie sighed and wished she could follow that up with a story about her father…but she didn't have one…so she couldn't.

"Then we have D.A.D.A and transfiguration rounded out with some good old Charms…interesting schedule."

"I guess," Annie said, feeling nervous again. The bell rang and everyone began to pile out of the room quickly. The older kids who knew where they were going left last while the first years quickly left the room together, looking at their maps in earnest.

"How do you like it so far?" a voice in her ear asked. She whipped around to see her cousin Nathan walking with his bag swinging next to him.

"Fine," Annie replied and looked down at her map. He read over her shoulder, turned her body around and pointed down the hall.

"That's the fastest way," he said. Annie smiled at him.

"Thanks," she replied.

"No problem," he said. "Gotta go. Got D.A.D.A with Potter now, see you later."

"Wait," Annie called, breaking away from her friends and going over to him. "How old is he?"

"Well, he's best friends with my father so-"

"He's best friends with your father?" Annie blurted out.

"Yeah! I mean, didn't you know that? Your mother dated him," he said. Annie felt her throat close up. She stared at her cousin who was suddenly looking nervous.

"You-you didn't know?" Nathan asked, not admitting that he had only heard that from his mother and father when they thought he wasn't listening.

"Of course I did!" Annie cried, laughing. Her heart was beating too fast and she was sure her cousin knew she was lying. "I'm going to be late." She turned and walked back to her friends.

"You look like you saw a ghost," Alice commented. Annie smiled and shook her head.

"No," she replied, "I just need to talk to my aunt Hermione is all…"

A/N Please read and review.


	6. The Surprises

**_Dislcaimer-_** Not Mine. Don't Own It.

* * *

**One Month Later**

Hermione had been busy or out or basically avoiding Annie for a month now. She had tried to catch her in the morning, using Professor Lupin's fire, she tried in the afternoon when she got home for work. Annie wrote dozens of letters which were either not answered or returned by her uncle Ron who said Hermione was very, very busy.

"Why don't you just ask your uncle Ron, if it's that important," Alice said one sunny Friday morning as they sat in the common room letting the sun rippled through the window and onto their chilled bodies. Annie picked her head up from the table and frowned.

"I never thought of that! Thanks Al!" she cried and took out a letter. "Marley, do you think your dad will let me use his fireplace again?"

"Why not?" Marley asked, throwing her hands up. "You've used it every night this month."

"It isn't my fault that-"

"I'm kidding," Marley said, rolling her eyes. "You've been sorta secretive lately…what's up?"  
"Nothing," Annie said quickly, her face flushing. "Well, I think it's nothing."

"Not even a hint?" Alice asked. Annie shook her head once and then bent it so that they wouldn't see the color which had risen to her cheeks.

"Will you tell us eventually?" Marley asked. Annie nodded earnestly.

"I just need to talk this over with my mum and maybe an uncle or two, you're third in line to know," Annie assured them.

"Well don't we feel special," Alice said as Marley pretended to become faint with excitement. Annie blushed and giggled again as she began to write a letter to her uncle.

_**Dear uncle Ron, **_it read, **_I was wondering if I could talk to you soon within the next couple of weeks. It's really, really important. Professor Lupin gave me permission to his fire whenever I needed it, so write me back with a reply. Kisses and hugs, Annie._**

"There," Annie said and handed it to Marley's owl, Achilles, who hooted dolefully and flew away into the cool air.

"Shut the window," Alice whined and shivered once before pulled her cloak closer to her.

"You know," someone said, coming over to them, "you aren't allowed to have the owls in the common rooms." Marley turned around and rolled her eyes.

"It was an emergency, Jonathan," she said continuing on with her essay. "Lighten up."

"I'm light, Marley, but you don't want it pooping in the Common room, do you?" he asked angrily.

"Maybe I do," she replied. He glared at her and then walked away to a girl with flaming red hair that Annie said was her cousin Carrie. "Big brothers are a pain the B-hind, I must say." She tutted and shook her head a few times as the bell overhead went off. "Time for D.A.D.A." Annie felt her heart jump as she thought about Harry Potter. There was something about him that was so familiar but she couldn't place it. She felt as though she had met him before or had seen him before when in actuality she only saw him at a distance. She wanted to tell her friends that there was something about him…so familiar, but she couldn't bring herself to do it because it was embarrassing to think about.

As she piled into the room where all the other Gryffindors were sitting, Annie got a look at Harry Potter who was writing the directions on the board. He turned to the class and clapped his hands together.

"Alright, does everyone have their essays?" he asked, walking to the front row and collecting them. Annie took out hers and placed it on the side of the desk as Harry came by and collected it. "Great, now we can begin. Does anyone know about Cornish pixies?"

Alice raised her hand high into the air, waving it around slightly. Annie was suddenly overcome with the sensation that she was sitting next to her aunt Hermione who still jumped whenever anyone asked her a simple question.

"Miss Longbottom?" Harry asked as he came back to his desk. Alice rattled off about a dozen answers to the question much of them things Annie didn't even know. She had read every single one of Hermione's essays to get a good idea of what the classes would be like. She had made the mistake of pointing out a mistake on her aunt's essay from second year when she was eight and thought her aunt was going to have a panic attack right there.

Annie watched Harry and couldn't help thinking that maybe he knew who her father was. He had been friends with Ron, he had been his mother's girlfriend, he was always at her grandparents, when she was conveniently out of town. He would know who her mother was seeing because she was sure her mother told Ron, or maybe someone in the family who told Ron…she was sure of it.

Lunch came shortly after class much to the relief of Annie who thought she was going to pass out from hunger. She had tried to quickly leave the class only to hear:

"Miss Weasley, could I see you for a moment?"

She froze and turned back to Harry who was putting stuff back into his desk with a messy sort of clutter. She waved goodbye to her friends and slowly walked back to the table where her professor and possible only help was standing.

"Yes?" she asked. "Is something wrong?"

"No, I just wanted to discuss your essay-"

"I didn't mean what I said, you know," she said quickly, "you know about the whole people who have house-elves should be hung by their toes over a pit of fire…that was just a stroke or something." Harry laughed and shook his head.

"I thought it was very well written for a first year to do," he replied. He turned to look at her and it hit him. For a split second he felt as though he were looking at an old photograph of himself from his first year. Her face was fuller and she was a bit taller than he was in his first year, but she looked just like him. He saw his green in her eyes and her smile was Ginny's. She had his laugh, he heard it; she had his nose, he saw it. He didn't know why he never saw it before! Her hair was his color, her eyes were half his, she was his…daughter.

"Are you alright?" she asked worriedly. He had turned a ghastly pale and looked as though he may just faint or become sick at any moment. Harry felt himself nod as he did the math in his head. The last time he had slept with Ginny was October 15th twelve years ago…maybe a little less then that. The next night he had left and the war was over within a month…She would have been born in June….that would have put Harry in the south of France drinking too much, partying with muggles or anyone he could find, trying to put a stopper onto the hole in his heart. While Ginny had been having a baby he had been too busy in his own selfish world. Still, she should have told him. He would have come back and just been there for her, been someone in her life…

Everything was making sense all of a sudden. He knew why the picture at the Weasley's guarded Annie from view and why Ginny had fled that day in the Leaky Cauldron. She didn't want him to see her and piece it together. He suddenly felt a white hot anger rippled from underneath the disbelief and nausea that was surfacing. Of all the things he had done it had never been as worse as what she had done. She kept a child from him. The girl who was now staring at him with worry, this girl who had grown up without a father. How many times had Ron mentioned a girl named Annie and Harry never picked up on it. Harry knew that there wasn't anyone in Ginny's life and hadn't been since Harry had left the last time, that meant Annie didn't have a father.

He closed his eyes once and when he opened them the girl was still standing in front of him, her big eyes filled with concern and something else…stifled curiosity. Perhaps Ginny had told Annie who her father was and Annie decided she wanted nothing to do with him? What if it were Annie who had decided that a relationship was something she didn't want with him.

What if Ginny had told Annie that Harry didn't want to come back? What if Ginny had made it out to be his fault?

_She wouldn't do that_, Harry scolded himself. However, another voice sneaked into his mind: _"She didn't tell you about Annie…who knows what she's capable of."_

Harry swallowed and looked back at his daughter, who looked so much like Ginny and at the same time so much like him that it was astonishing. He knew why he couldn't see it before…she looked enough like Ginny so that it wasn't obvious that she was his daughter but when you got a good look at her she was so much like Harry it was remarkable. One could almost compare it to drawing a 3-D block on a piece of paper. On one angle, she looked totally and completely like Ginny with black hair; however, if you shifted, much like the cube, her appearance switched and she looked more like Harry.

There was no denying it. She was his daughter.

"Are you alright, Professor?" Annie asked again. Harry nodded again.

"I'm not feeling very well," he lied. Suddenly he felt his collar get too tight and he felt the urge to run from the room. He needed to get away from her and quick. He needed to have a nice long chat with Ginny. "Listen, I have to go, nice essay, see you in class tomorrow-"

"No, wait! I needed to ask you about-"

"I really need to be going, maybe another time," Harry said and quickly ran from the room. Annie winced when the door slammed shut. She waited ten deep breaths and then slowly walked out of the room and back to the Common Room where her friends were bickering over an essay.

"-can't be that long!" Marley insisted. "I know he's mean, but this is absolute crap!" She tossed the essay onto the floor and then, just for effect, she stomped on it once…twice, and picked it back up again. "I still have two more feet to write! Annie, how far along are you?"

"I-I- um, huh?" she asked, scratching her head and lowering herself into a chair across from her friends. Marley rolled her eyes and sneaked a peek over at Alice who was busy scribbling on a four foot long roll of parchment.

"Never mind," Marley said, "this came while you were talking to Professor Potter." She reached behind her and handed Annie a rolled up piece of parchment. Annie jumped up.

"It's from my uncle Ron!" she cried and tugged it open, scanning the page for a date and time. "Can you ask your dad if I can use the fireplace tonight?"

"Sure," Marley said. "I need to visit them anyways. Alice, you wanna come with?"

"Nah," Alice said, "my essay is almost done and if I get distracted I usually lose whatever I have stored up in my head."

"Just tell me, I'll keep it safe for you," Marley suggested.

"For the last time, you can't cheat off of me!" Alice cried. Marley pouted for fifteen minutes before Alice caved and pushed her essay over.

OoOoOoOoOo

"How long do you think you'll be?" Lupin asked as they entered his office, which had a vast fireplace along the right wall.

"About five minutes?" Annie asked. "I just have a quick question for him and that's it."

"Alright," Lupin said and hesitated. Annie gave him a smile and waited for him to leave. "Right…well, I'll leave you alone, then?" He quickly shuffled out leaving Annie standing in his cozy office. She sighed and strode over to the fireplace, trying to find her usual calm nerves.

"This is going to be fine," she muttered to herself, "just ask him and get it over with! Do it! And stop talking to yourself, you weirdo." She took a shuddering breath and grabbed a handful of powder. "Weasley Manor." She stuck her head into the fire and waited patiently. "Uncle Ron?" she called loudly, waiting for her uncle's footsteps to come over.

A moment later, she heard footsteps and saw two giant feet come into view. He bent down and they faced each other for an instant.

"What's up kid?" he asked. "You sounded pretty urgent in your letter."

"Yes, well, I just needed to ask you something," Annie said, clearing her throat.

"Ok, shoot," he said. She took a deep breath.

"I know my mother dated Harry Potter," Annie began, Ron nodded. "How long did they date for?"

"Well…they dated for about five months in my sixth year…" Ron said and Annie felt her heart sink slightly. "Oh, wait! Then they dated again for about another six months when Harry was about twenty and your mother was almost twenty. They dated right up until October when the war get pretty bad."

"Thanks, uncle Ron," she said with a smile.

"That's what you wanted to know?" Ron asked.

"Yup," Annie said. She took her head out of the fire and sighed. She got to her feet. All she knew was that her mother dated Harry Potter for six months, he left, she dated her father and got pregnant with her. No closer to finding out her father was.

As Annie got back to the Common Room for the fourth time that day, she felt like a stupid schoolgirl. Did she really think she was going to find out her father was from her uncle _Ron_? She sighed again and stepped back as the portrait flew open.

"Hey missy! I waited for you, but you took too long," Marley said.

"I'm ready to tell you why I've been so titchy these past few weeks," Annie said, sitting down.

"Ooh intrigue," Marley said and bit into come chocolate. Alice was still scribbling on her paper.

"I wanted to find out who my father was," Annie said.

"Done with the essay," Alice said, raising her eyes at Annie's statement and put her quill down, giving Annie her full attention. "And?"

"Nothing," Annie said with a shrug. "I asked my uncle Ron who could be my father and he didn't know. All he said was that my mother dated Harry Potter-"

"WHAT?" Marley cried, choking on her chocolate. "She dated Harry Potter? Harry freaking Potter? They boy who saved the world? That Harry Potter?"

"No, they other Harry Potter, the one who sat on his arse and watched the world go down in flames," Alice said sarcastically. She turned back to Annie. "So your mom dated Harry Potter…"

"Yeah, up until October 31st when she was twenty," Annie said with a sigh. Marley went back to her own little dazed world.

"She would have been cutting it close," Alice said, going back to her essay.

"Huh?" Annie asked.

"Your mom," Alice said, not really placing her attention back on Annie. "You were born June 22nd, and you said your mom and Harry Potter dated up until October 31st. You would have been conceived around October 15th ish."

A/N Please read and review.


	7. The Talk

**_Disclaimer-_ Not Mine. Don't own it.**

* * *

For the entire month that Annie had been in school, Ginny had waited on tenterhooks to get word from her daughter, who was sure to be apoplectic about the news. However, a day turned into four days, four days into a week, and finally a week turned into a month with nothing so much as a whisper of anything out of the ordinary. Annie had been writing frequently to Hermione, apparently wanting to ask her something about a class project. Normally Hermione was the first person to jump on the opportunity, but she kept her distance incase Annie had found out and tried to weasel the information out of her. 

The house had been silent and almost unbearable at times. Ginny went from seeing her daughter, her life force, every day to seeing her once every six months. She missed her laughter after reading a letter from her older cousin Mia, who was a year older then Annie. She missed tripping over Annie's easel everytime she went down the stairs. She missed the bellow that sounded after the trip, screaming that one day she was going to break her neck and come back and haunt her daughter forever.

Early one Sunday morning Ginny could be found sitting at her kitchen table reading the paper quietly as she sipped on her tea, as usual. She kept searching the skies for Annie's letter, which came every Sunday morning at nine o'clock.

A loud, banging on the door jolted her out of her stupor as she turned to stare at the door. She frowned, wondering who would be bothering her so early in the morning and wondering what it could be about. At first she feared maybe it was one of her brother's informing her that her floo was busted once again. She heaved a sigh and lifted herself from her chair. As her slippers padded on the wooden floor, the door got banged on once again.

"Alright, alright," she called, "I'm coming. Hold your knickers." She tied her pale pink bathrobe closer to her body and pulled the door open. "What now-" she began, but found herself staring into emerald green eyes that were looking nothing less than furious.

"Ah, Ginny," Harry said cheerfully, as though they did this everyday, he and she. "May I come in? Thank you." He didn't wait for an answer, instead just pushed past her and walked into the house, looking around almost sadly.

"Harry-" Ginny said, trying to catch her bearings. "What're you doing here?"

"Guess who I saw the other day," Harry said, his cheerful voice now becoming cold like the winter wind.

"I d-don't know," Ginny said, feeling ice seep into her veins.

"Guess," Harry growled, his voice was no longer cheerful but deadly. She gulped again and walked over to the table, leaning against it to prevent herself from collapsing to the floor. "You don't want to guess? Alright, I'll tell you. I saw _our_ daughter the other day." Ginny clamped her eyes shut. "In fact, I've seen her everyday for an entire month! Isn't that funny? Isn't it just so frigging hilarious? My daughter, the one I've never met because my ex-girlfriend NEVER TOLD ME!" He now looked as though her may hit her. "How could you?" he bellowed.

"I could I?" Ginny cried, opening her eyes. Her throat was tight with the attempt to keep the tears away. "You took off and we didn't hear one word from you for TWO MONTHS and one day you come back and act as though everything is just peachy. We have sex, thinking our relationship is coming back, and you leave again! How could I? How could _you_?"

"I may have been a prat but nothing, NOTHING, I've ever done was as bad as what you did, Ginny," he snarled. "You kept a baby from me."

"Harry, do you remember what you were like when you came back?" Ginny asked, folding her arms. She looked at his face and could see that she had hit a nerve. "I couldn't be with you and I couldn't have a baby with you. Harry, you were so angry and depressed and just not there that it would have been unfair to Annie for me to expect you to be a father for her."

"Alright, so maybe when I came back I was messed up, that was a year-"

"More like five," Ginny snapped.

"Ginny if you told me that I had a daughter don't you think that maybe I would have done something other then drink myself to sleep every night?" Harry snapped.

"I don't know and I couldn't take that chance," Ginny said sadly.

"How could you do this to me?" Harry bellowed.

"What good would it have done for me to tell you?" Ginny cried.

"A lot of good," Harry cried. "She would have given me something to live for!"

"What about me, Harry?" Ginny whispered. "Why was I never enough to keep you here? Why wasn't my love enough to save you-"

"You did save me from Voldemort," Harry said.

"Not from him," Ginny whispered, "from yourself." Harry swallowed and rubbed his hair in a nervous habit he had developed over the years.

"Does she hate me?" Harry asked suddenly. "I mean, she seems fine in class-" Ginny winced and Harry flared up again. "She doesn't even know who I am, does she?" he asked, laughing a furious, frustrated laugh. He turned away and turned back, rubbing his hair again.

"It was just never the right time to tell her," Ginny explained.

"Did she ever ask?" Harry inquired.

"Well…yes, but-"

"Don't you think that maybe that was the time to tell her?" Harry asked in a contradicting tone.

"Harry James Potter, don't you dare flounce in here and tell me how to raise my own daughter!" Ginny bellowed, pointing a finger at him. "I didn't want to tell her until I told you, alright? And…I just never got the courage. Don't you think I realized that I should have told you right away? The years kept going by and I kept putting it off. Then I heard you got a job at Hogwarts…you don't know how many times I threw floo into the fire thinking I would go over and talk to you-"

"That was you?" Harry asked. "Really pissed Snape off." Ginny looked confused. "Snape had moved into my office for a few months as we redid the wings that were ruined by the war. He kept throwing down his quill or swearing in a foreign language…quite funny actually. He actually thought it was me for a while and kept yelling at me…" he trailed off and took a deep sigh. "Are you ever going to tell her?"

"I think so," Ginny said with a shaky laugh. "Maybe over Christmas break…" Harry looked over at her with raised eyebrows. "Maybe after that if she doesn't hate us both…we could work something out…if she wants to." Harry brightened up.

"Really?" he asked, looking as happy as he used to, before the war. "You wouldn't mind?"

"No," Ginny said, shaking her head. "Maybe she could stay a week with you in the summer. I'm pretty sure once she wraps her head around everything, she'll really like that. Just…promise me something."

"Alright," he said, turning back to her.

"You're either in or you're out," Ginny said, shifting her weight. "This little girl has waited her entire life to meet her father and you will not bail out on her like you did to me. No breaking promises. No canceling dates that we've set up. This isn't a part time, 'I'll do it when I feel like it' type of a job. You can't be there when you want out when you don't. So, you tell me right now. You're in or you're out."

"I'm in," Harry said almost instantly. "Really, I'm in." Ginny tried not to show her surprise as Harry looked antsy at first and calmed down some.

"Good," Ginny said, feeling a weight lift off of her shoulders. "Oh, another thing."

"Yeah?" Harry asked.

"Don't tell her," Ginny said, tugging on her hair. "Just don't really even talk to her out of the teacher/student privilege thing. Don't make her suspicious or make her do something weird."

"Deal," Harry said and made his way to the door. "Bye Ginny."

"Bye Harry," she said softly. She closed her eyes and opened them as the door closed. Suddenly, she found her self running to the door. "Harry!" she cried, just as he was about to Apparate away. He looked over at her, stunned.

"Why don't you come to Christmas dinner this year," Ginny said quickly before she lost her courage. Harry had been caught off guard.

"Ok," he said, finding a smile slip onto his face. "See you later Ginny." He seemed to hesitate and then quickly strode across the yard and kissed her lightly on the cheek. She seemed to stiffen and relax within minutes and smiled back over at Harry.

"Bye, Harry," she said and stepped back into the house. She closed her eyes and lowered herself into an arm chair by the fireplace. Her breathing was erratic, but not from fear or anxiety. It was something different, as though she were excited about everything that had happened. This could be the start of something good. Or maybe it's the start of something more.

She wondered how Annie would take the news when she got it.

OoOoOoOoOo

Back at Hogwarts, Annie was still fuming, twelve hours after finding out her father was none other then Harry Potter. The night before she had screamed into her pillow for three hours before she thought her throat split in half. It still hurt to talk…or breath.

Marley and Alice knew something was up with her, knew that she was upset about something that had happened. Annie refused to say anything and kept on a pouty face for the rest of the night. The thought of her mother keeping something so important from her made her blood boil. Usually, she was able to keep her cool by taking a few deep breaths and punching a pillow to a pulp, repairing it and starting all over. However, sometimes she got so worked up she flung her books across the room, hearing the satisfied crack as they collided with the walls. At some point she had taken things that would break and flung them across the wall, feeling a sense of giddiness when they smashed or shattered.

"You wake her," someone whispered outside of her bed. She had been awake for two hours, not being able to sleep much. She rolled her eyes as her friend continued.

"Oh, no!" Marley hissed. "That girl has got a mean right hook, did you see what she did to the pillow? Not to mention the things she was blasting last night-You do it."

"My parents would _kill_ me if I got killed," Alice whispered.

"You'd already be dead you twink," Marley snapped and Annie felt her roll her giant grey eyes. "Fine! I'll do it! You just tell my parents it was Elliot if something happens to me." Annie heard Marley's timid footsteps come towards the bed and sat up silently. She pulled back the curtain, jumping as her friends both shrieked and took three steps back, their wands drawn. "Annie?"

"Put those things away before you hurt yourself," Annie snapped, standing up and stretching.

"It was Marley's idea," Alice said in a small voice. Marley glared at her.

"Listen," Annie said, speaking slowly so they would understand her, "I'm just not in a good mood. I realized something all of a sudden, something I should have known, DESERVED to know…" Annie trailed off and clenched her fists. She took three steadying breaths and turned to her friends with a smile. "I really need to talk to my mother."

"Christmas is only two months away…" Marley said, smiling. "It'll go by in a blast."

"Maybe," Annie said, feeling only anger as she thought of her mother. Her lying, secret keeping mother.

Throughout the day, Annie's friends tried to convince her to come out with them and walk around campus. It wasn't until three in the afternoon when Annie had become bored with her solitude that she ventured out into the halls, searching for her friends. She was halfway to the library when she collided with someone's shoulder.

"Sorry," the voice said. She looked up and felt her throat close. "Oh, An-Miss Weasley."

"Professor Potter," Annie said awkwardly. "Sorry." She looked at him and then did the only thing she could think of. Run. She had said a rushed goodbye and took off down the halls, desperate to get away before she started crying or yelling or cursing.

Harry watched his daughter rush off and felt a wave of guilt seep into him. This girl, this darling girl who had never done anything wrong and did not deserve him as a father, was his daughter. He sighed and walked off down the halls.

A/N Please read and review.

I'm thinking of taking a break from writing just because I'm kind of getting sick and tired of all the reviews I get where people nit-pick every little thing I say. I mean, I am not a professional writer, I am allowed mistakes but to have them constantly pointed out every single chapter gets very annoying. I know reviews are for the readers to give their thoughts of the chapters, but I mean if I make a mistake it isn't as though I'm going back in to fix it, especially some of the minor ones. So please, all I ask of you is that when I write something, don't tear it apart critizing what and how I write. It's very frustrating and if it doesn't stop I am taking an indefinite leave. Thank you so much for listening to my bitching, please review.


	8. The Tension Grows

**Disclaimer: I don't own this. It's not mine. **

**A/N: I'm interested in a beta for my stories. I need someone who isn't extremely busy seeing as I update a few times a week if not once a day…So, anyone interested just let me know. My beta-ing wouldn't include just grammatical errors but also plot errors such as: my wording seems awkward or maybe I mentioned something that would contradict another statement. Also, I would be willing to listen to the beta's thoughts and ideas for the story. And you would also get to see most of the story first, but just let me know. Remember I need someone with a lot of time to spare because I update frequently. Thank you. Just e-mail me either in a review or in a e-mail and give your e-mail.**

* * *

"Vampires are easy to spot if you know where to look," Harry said, walking around the room until he was back in front of his desk. He turned back to his students who were taking notes diligently. His eyes traveled slowly around to the room until they landed on Annie, as they usually did. She wasn't taking notes, instead she was looking at him with narrowed eyes as though thinking about a hard problem. 

In fact, Annie was piecing everything together slowly in her mind wondering how she ever missed something to obvious. Now that she knew he was her father, everything suddenly made sense. Why her mother had freaked out in Diagon Alley. She would give her entire allowance that he had been sitting in there and that's why her mother had dragged her across the town, to keep as much distance as possible.

That would also explain her sudden anger when Annie mentioned her father, or father's day, or Harry Potter Day, which came one day before her birthday. Everything made sense. This was the man who had abandoned her before she was even born. This is the man who took off after realizing his girlfriend was pregnant. This man, this…idiot, left her before she even got a chance to know her and for eleven years he hasn't so much as sent a card or said hello or wanted to know about her. How could he just sit across from her and act like nothing happened?

"The first thing you need to look for is the pale skin," Harry said, tearing his eyes away from his daughter and looking over at the other Gryffindors. Some were looking at him in awe and semi-puppy love. Once again, he felt his eyes being drawn back to almost identical eyes which were not filled with the usual awe and love, but instead, anger and confusion…and almost desperation. It was as though Annie were pleading with Harry, telling him to just open his eyes and see her sitting there; see her watching him with his eyes, writing with the same hand he did; laughing his laugh. "Second," Harry said, his voice had trailed off. "Is their aversion for then sunlight." More quills started scratching as Harry wrote something down on the board, he was sure what. He turned around and started back at the class. "Alright, now I'm going to give you time in class to do your essay, some of you will finish by the end of the class period." There was a shuffle as everyone hurriedly began writing. Harry turned around and realized his charmed chalk, which had been charmed to his weekly lesson plan, had done all the writing for him. It was a good thing too, Harry's mind was not on teaching.

Annie blinked and looked around at the students who began writing and reading from their books. She brushed her hair back frantically and looked around the room.

"What's going on? What did I miss?" she hissed frantically, looking down at her notes to see they were filled with scribbled ramblings.

"You didn't listen?" Alice asked, clearly outraged. "Annie, it's going to be on the quiz on Thursday!"

"I'm a little distracted is all," Annie mumbled, thinking about her run in with Harry on Sunday. She had sped off, unsure of what she should have done. She couldn't exactly be, "Oh, hi dad, didn't see you there."

"About what?" Marley asked, she leaned in closer, her big grey eyes filled with concern. "You can tell us, Annie. We will understand."

"I found out who my father is," Annie whispered. Alice's ink top popped off with a loud pop and hit Laurie Thomas in the back of the head. She muttered a sorry and turned back to Annie with wide eyes.

"You what?" she hissed. Her giant blue eyes were wide with the same shock as Marley's. Annie sighed and leaned in closer.

"I know who he is," Annie muttered.

"Who?" Marley and Alice asked together, trying to keep their voices down. Annie winced and then cocked her head to Harry who was quietly grading essays. Marley and Alice turned around with confused expressions on their faces but when they turned back they looked as if they hadn't heard new like this ever.

"Harry Potter?" Alice hissed, her voice going up to a tone only dogs could hear. Marley was looking wide eyed at Annie and kept looking back and forth between them and suddenly squeaked.

"I totally see it," she whispered. "You have the same nose-"

"And eyes," Alice quipped.

"I even think you have the same fingernails," Marley offered.

"Huh?" Annie hissed, giggling for the first time in weeks. "How can you tell?"

"I just can," she replied stubbornly, "I have that eye."

"You should become a professional finger-nail spotter," Alice said, giggling. Marley now looked huffy at the sudden teasing she was being subjected to. Annie was giggling non-stop and suddenly found the situation bearable. If her friends didn't find Harry to be as big a deal as she was making it inside her head, why should she? She sighed with a smile and began to write her essay. Everything seemed to be a little less dramatic all of a sudden.

Harry had been watching Annie briefly wondering just how she felt about him. Was there anger or hurt when she though of the father she never met. Was there resentment? Want? Need? Anything?

**2 months later**

As the train pulled into the station, Annie felt nerves and anger seep into her veins. For three months she had told herself that she was dealing with it appropriately. She hadn't yelled at her mother, although she rarely wrote like she used to Ginny anymore. Ginny wrote every week and Annie answered briefly, writing down the basics and tried to be friendly, only to find that she couldn't. It hurt to know that her mother had lied to her for so many years and had kept her father who at times was so close, so far away.

"Maybe, you could just mention it in an off-hand manner and see what happens," Alice suggested as they went along the smooth tracks. Both Marley and Alice knew just how important this day was for Annie, that she was finally going to see her mother face to face and she was finally going to tell her how she felt. 'As a cool, calm, grown-up lady,' as Alice put it. She, Alice, said that Ginny would be more likely to listen to a grown-up accusation then just yelling and screaming. Annie grudgingly agreed.

"I'm ready for my grandma's home cooking," Marley said dreamily. "Nice chocolate cookies…cake…fudge…"

"Oh, so you're planning on gaining thirty pounds over the winter break?" Annie asked with a giggle. Marley gave her a huffy glare. "I'm really nervous."

"Don't be," Alice said immediately. "Act as though nothing's wrong and ask her about it when you're home. You decide when the best time will be. Whether it be the car or Christmas dinner, it's up to you."

"Right," Annie said, biting her lip. She took a deep breath as the train slowed. "Oh…we're here…"

"Don't worry," Marley said. "You're going to be FINE!"

"I am…right?" Annie said. She took another deep breath. "I am!"

"Sing it sista," Marley said as she gathered her stuff. Alice and Annie giggled again and grabbed their bags and cats.

Ginny had been up since dawn. She had tried to eat and she had tried to read the paper but all had failed as she realized that tomorrow night she was going to explain to her daughter EVERYTHING. She was sick of lying to Annie who had never been anything but wonderful. Ginny had one of the best daughters a mother could hope for and all she'd done was mess with her life over and over again. It wasn't right, it couldn't continue this way.

Annie appeared from the crowd, her hair shining despite the lack of sun in the closed area. Ginny sighed with happiness when she saw her daughter coming closer.

"Annie!" she cried, and started over to her daughter who hesitated and then began to run towards her mother.

Despite the anger inside of her, Annie missed her mother. She missed everything about her and didn't want to ruin a holiday over something like this. She wouldn't throw a hiss fit and turn Ginny off, she would talk about this as though she were a grown adult.

"Mum, I missed you!" Annie whispered into her mother's hair. They had been standing, just hugging for ten minutes when Ginny opened her eyes. She saw Harry standing near the clock, just watching them, a subdued expression on his face. Ginny smiled at him briefly and then pulled away from her daughter who was looking as though she may just burst.

"Annie, what's the matter?" Ginny asked calmly as she led her daughter out to Hermione's borrowed car. The old Beatle was from at least twenty years ago, and that was being kind. Ginny had already pushed into the door with all her weight just to get it to open and was now having trouble opening the door from the outside.

"Nothing," Annie commented lightly, closing her mouth tightly. "Did you try the handle?"

"Did I try the handle?" Ginny said in a mocking voice. "What do you think I'm stu-" Her hand closed down on the handle and the door 'magically' sprung open. "Stupid," Ginny said weakly.

"You? Stupid? Never!" Annie said sarcastically and slid into the seat as her mother went around the car. Ginny had a dull flush on her cheeks but didn't say anything more as they took off onto the road. More then anything, Annie was afraid of being in a car with her mother. Her mother couldn't drive and seemed to think a yellow light meant speed up and red lights were just there for color.

"Oh," Ginny snapped, "open your eyes!"

"Is the old lady and her dog still alive?" Annie asked, keeping her eyes clenched shut.

"Yes," Ginny sang, "she did get right back up."

"Mum!" Annie cried and glared angrily over at her mother. It seemed so easy to forget everything happened and it seemed so easy to pretend it never did happen. But something inside Annie wouldn't let her…she realized it was humiliation of being kept in the dark so long, humiliation because everyone else knew, but not her, and humiliation because she hadn't seen it sooner.

"I want to paint the kitchen walls white. What do you think? Ginny asked, taking a deep breath. They had been home for an hour now and Annie had settled in, she was now sitting on the couch by the fire.

"Mum?" Annie called, not listening to her mother's ramblings.

"Huh?" Ginny asked.

"Can you come in here, please?" Annie asked. Now was her chance. She was going to be cool, calm and collected about this. Ginny entered, looking worried.

"Yeah, babe?" Ginny asked.

"Who's my father?" Annie asked. Ginny felt her heart sink. "Is it Harry Potter?"

A/N Please read and review. This chappie was pointless, but it's leading up to the big meltdown sequence. Are you excited? I am…


	9. The Truth is Out

Disclaimer: Don't own it. Nothing but the plot and some of the character's are mine. Pity, but true.

* * *

"I'll take your gaping silence as a yes, then?" Annie snapped. Ginny sat down hard on the armchair, her mind reeling with white hot anger. How could Harry DO that to her? How could he tell Annie? How could she ever trust him again? "I bet you really want to know how I found out, huh?" 

"No," Ginny said, shaking her head, "I already know." She clenched her jaw and turned back to her daughter who looked angry and disappointed in her.

"Well," Annie snapped, "I'm going to tell you. I was talking to someone and they said that you dated Harry Potter when you were at Hogwarts," Annie began and Ginny winced, "so naturally, I was a tad curious. So I had a chat with uncle Ron and he informed me that you and Harry were still dating all the way to around early November." Ginny could feel a faint sweat on her forehead as Annie glared at her. "I was born in June, that would make me conceived early October, around the same time you were still dating Harry Potter. How could you?"

Ginny felt sick as she stared down at her hands. Annie was right to feel angry, Annie was right to feel so pissed off at Ginny that she may never speak to her again. It wasn't fair for either Harry or Annie.

"I did what I thought was best," Ginny said softly, looking up and staring into her daughter's eyes, the green specs glimmering in the soft lamplight.

"You lied to me," Annie whispered. "My entire life has been one big lie to you, hasn't it? How many people have you told besides me? How many people know?"

"Annie, don't get upset. It isn't like that-"

"Mum, don't you dare tell me not to get upset!" Annie cried. "You told me my father left!"

"He did!"

"You made me feel like such a burden, like such a waste of time-"

"I never meant-"

"But it did, mum! It did," Annie cried, rubbing her hands on her pants. She took a few calming breaths and managed to blink back the sharp stab of tears. "Tell me."

"What do you want to hear?" Ginny whispered.

"Everything," Annie replied. Ginny sighed and thought back to the first day she ever saw Harry and the way he made her feel. Even at ten she knew that one day she would be with him.

"Ok," Ginny said, biting her lip. "I saw him for the first time when I was ten and mum and I were going with the boys to Hogwarts…I just couldn't stop staring at him. His eyes, his hair, his smile…the scar…everything seemed so perfect, so beautiful that I felt something really weird come over me. After that all I could think about was him. Mum called it a crush or puppy love and I spent the first two years at Hogwarts terribly in love with your father-" The words tumbled out of Ginny's mouth to Annie, who was listening intently. "-I kept wishing that I he would stop seeing me as Ron's little sister and see me as something else…even a friend if that was what it had to be. You know, he saved my life." Annie raised her eyebrows and Ginny nodded. "I was eleven and somehow I got Tom Riddle's diary with my school things…well, one thing led to another and he saved me from expulsion, death, my mother's furry. I fell in love with him that day…real love."

Annie watched as her mother's eyes misted over and realized with a start that Ginny was still in love with him, and probably always would be.

"Well, after that it got quite unbearable to even be around him. My face was always hot, my hands were always sweaty and absolutely nothing intelligible came out of my mouth, even if I tried! It so embarrassing to have him see me all flustered when all I really wanted him to do was stop looking at me like that. Stop looking at me as though I was a child with a crush, stop looking at me as though I were just another stupid girl in love with the famous Harry Potter because it wasn't like that. I didn't love him because of what he had done before, I love him because of the way he was. He was shy at the best of times, modest, kind, sweet, handsome…he was just Harry and I wished more then anything that I could have him.

"One day I woke up and it hit me. He will never see me as someone other than little Ginny Weasley unless I stop being so obvious about everything. So…I got my first boyfriend and pretended that I didn't have feelings for him anymore. I never predicted how well it would work. Of course I got some help such as aunt Hermione and uncle Ron became prefects and Harry was left out of it. At times I was the only one to talk to and I managed to keep my blush down, my hands dry, and very intelligible thoughts came out of my mouth. He suddenly saw me as something of a friend.

"Voldemort hit again and left Harry even more angry and bitter then before after he killed Harry's godfather, Sirius. Plus, his entire fifth year consisted of people telling him he was a liar and Voldemort wasn't back, but then everyone found out he was, so it all turned out ok." Ginny quickly got back to the point in case Annie got bored or become angry again. "Anyways, my fifth year something amazing happened. He kissed me for the first time. It was magical and slightly annoying. I had always thought my first kiss with him would be sweet and romantic maybe down at the lake or in mum's garden one summer night. Not after a Quidditch game where I smelled like B.O. and had sweat, some not even mine, covered all over my face. That didn't seem to matter to him, he scooped me up and kissed me. Also, in front of EVERYONE, which was embarrassing. But then things got good and we started dating. He was nothing like my other boyfriends. He could kiss, unlike Michael Coroner who seemed more interested in suffocating me with his tongue then anything. By the way, Annie, if a boy can't kiss, try and teach him, if he still can't kiss, dump him. Believe me when I say it will help-" Annie raised one eyebrow signaling Ginny to go on. "Right…well…

"Dumbledore died that year, about a week before school ended. Snape killed him-"

"WHAT?" Annie cried, looking horrified. Ginny seemed confused and then gave a short laugh.

"Oh," she spluttered, "all cleared up. It was a big misunderstanding."

"So Snape didn't kill Dumbledore?"

"No, he did," Ginny said.

"Then how was it all cleared up?" Annie asked.

"It's very complicated," Ginny said, waving a hand in briefly, "something about a pensive and Dumbledore said to and Snape didn't want to but had to…Can I please finish my story?"

"Oh, by all means," Annie said sarcastically, waving her hand.

"Ok, where was I?" Ginny muttered. "Oh, yes- Well, that summer Harry changed. He tried to break up with me, something I wouldn't have. I went along with it for a little while until he got really annoying with it and we had some words. See, Voldemort couldn't kill Harry because Harry had his mother's love, which Voldemort now had. But as long as someone could love Harry in a different way, a more intimate way, then Harry would be safe to fight. For a while we didn't know what that meant until it suddenly came to me. By then, we had been in a war for about three years or so, I was nineteen at the time. I won't get into the gorey details because you're scarred enough, but it worked. Harry defeated Voldemort and I conceived you." Annie frowned, not an angry frown but a thoughtful frown. "I realized the spell could only work if there was someone else that could love Harry more then anything. I realized that in order to truly defeat Voldemort, I need to have a child to carry on in Harry's blood."

"I was conceived to save good magic?" Annie whispered. Ginny shook her head and went over to her daughter, bending down and cupping her face in her hands.

"No, baby," Ginny whispered, "you were conceived to save me. You were here to keep me going when it got bad and you were here so that one day, your father could realize that no matter how many bad things happen in the world, no matter how much is taken away from us, it always gives up back something extra special. And that was you. You were your father's miracle. You were what saved us."

OoOoOoOo

The Burrow seemed much bigger then the last time Harry had seen it, about four years ago. The old house still seemed lopsided as though any minute it was going to give out and tumble to the ground. He took a deep breath, shifted the bag over his shoulder, and walked up the uneven steps. The door even seemed bigger as he knocked twice.

"Uh, in a minute!" Mrs. Weasley called from inside. Harry could hear some swearing, a crash and then another swear and wondered briefly if he should have called first. The door opened and Mrs. Weasley came out, her head bent, wiping frosting off of her hands. "Yes- Harry!" she screamed and wrapped him into a violent hug. He literally felt the wind get knocked out of him as his ribs strained against Molly's boa-like hug. "Oh, we've missed you!" Harry felt guilt slowly seep into him as she stepped back and wiped the tears out of her with the corner of the napkin. "Come in, come in! Arthur, look who's here!"

"What, dear?" Arthur asked, sticking his head out from a doorway. His face lit up and he quickly hurried over to Harry, giving him an equally bone breaking hug. "Harry Potter, well, I'll be damned!" Harry smiled as the hug went from a hug to just holding on.

"How have you been?" Harry asked, slightly awkwardly. He didn't know if they knew what he knew and if they didn't he didn't want to say anything.

"Great," Molly said, happily filling a plate with food. "Here, dear, eat up. You're too skinny!" Harry smiled gratefully and sat down, looking at the old kitchen.

"Where is everyone?" he asked.

"Well, let's see," Molly said. "Bill's in Egypt-" she muttered something Harry couldn't make out but it sounded as though she had called Fleur a really bad name "-Charlie is back in Romania, Percy is at the Ministry-" Percy had finally been forgiven by the entire Weasley family after he managed to get very useful information for the war. "-The twins are at that awful shop of theirs and Ron and Hermione are upstairs with the kids." Harry noticed she didn't mention Ginny, she never did. "Now, you will stay for Christmas dinner won't you?"

"Uh, Molly-" Arthur said quickly. "When you're done I need to ask you about something."  
"Sure, dear," Molly said sweetly and turned back to Harry. He quickly finished his meal of pancakes, bacon, eggs, toast, sausage, ham, French toast and some mixed fruit and followed Molly up the stairs, feeling very sleepy. "Here, dear, you can sleep here." She let Harry into the room that had been magically added after the War. It was one of eleven so that all the kids and grandkids could stay here at once. Harry's room resembled his broom cupboard at the Dursley's only he had a window and there were no locks on the outside of the door. "It's a bit cramped, but-"

"It's perfect, thank you, Molly," Harry said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. She smiled at him and handed him some fresh towels.

"Hermione and Ron should be waking up soon and we'll have breakfast," Molly said, forgetting she just fed Harry enough to feed a small country.

"Sure," Harry replied, looking around the room. He sat down on the bed and smiled. Molly left him to his thoughts and slowly traveled back down the stairs, a goofy smile on her face.

Two minutes later Harry realized he had forgotten his bag on the kitchen floor. He got up, stretched his legs and opened the door, facing the silent hallways. As he got closer to the kitchen, he stopped, listening to two angry voices fighting. He was about to turn around when he heard his name.

"-Harry can't be here when they get here, Molly!" Arthur whispered furiously. "Do you know what Ginny is going to do if she sees Harry here when Annie is here as well?"

"What would have liked me to do, Arthur?" Molly snapped. Her voice soon turned sarcastic: "'Hello, dear. Nice to see you for the first time in four years. Sorry we can't have you stay with us but your daughter is here and her mother doesn't want you to have any contact with her. Bye, dear!'"

"Molly, you know that we all missed Harry and that we all want Harry to stay with us, but-"

"But nothing!" Molly cried, her voice rising slightly. "I have sat by and watched the years slip by as Harry and Ginny grew further apart and that girl, your granddaughter, grow up without a father! No more, Arthur! Now, Ginny can either deal with it…or leave because this is my house!"

"Are you mad?" Arthur snapped.

"Possibly," Molly retorted. "There is no reason why Annie should be kept from her father anymore. If she gets angry, blame it on me. It's just a little matchmaking."

"See, the thing is, dear," Arthur snapped, "she doesn't know we know!"

"Oh," Molly cried, "how could she not? EVERYONE knows! That girl is the mirror image of him!"

"Obviously he doesn't know and it won't do any good to spring her upon him-"

"Arthur, he has the right to know," Molly said softly. "You yourself has said it on many occasions."

"I know he does," Arthur snapped, rubbing his head. "I just don't think it our place to decide when she tells him, that's all." Molly let out a sigh.

"I keep kicking myself for not saying anything earlier!" Molly suddenly burst out, making Harry jump. "Ooh, I just let her lie and lie and lie to us! 'Some Irish wizard boyfriend' she said! Huh! I've never met a black haired, green eyed wizard in my entire life! I should have said something a long time ago! I should have said something to her, told her it wasn't right, keeping a baby from him."

"She wasn't doing it out of spite, Molly!" Arthur snapped slightly. "We all remember what Harry was like when he came back." Harry felt himself blush and a familiar guilt come back to him. "She knew what it would do to him and I agree with her!"

"That baby should have had a family!" Molly cried.

"She did! She does, Molly!" Arthur cried. "Your daughter raised that baby on her own with help from no one. I don't blame her one bit. I would have done the same."

"Oh," Molly said, snorting, "I would have loved to see that. Arthur Weasley giving birth-" Arthur blushed and then glared at his wife.

"You know what I mean!"

"I do," Molly said with a sigh, "but you can't tell me that deep down in the tiniest corner of your heart that you don't think this is a good idea…can you?" Arthur didn't answer and Molly gave him a smile and went back to washing dishes.

Harry slowly turned around and walked back up the stairs, tripping over his bag, which had been placed on the landing, and walking down the hall. He stopped outside of his room and turned towards the door down the hall. It had a sign that read, in pink glittering letter's: Ginny's Room. Underneath it, it said: Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again, in black letters on a white poster. He smiled and slowly opened the door, taking in the familiar room before him. He looked at the light pink walls and deep pink carpet on the floor. The bed was made up and looked as though it hadn't been slept in in a year or so. He smiled at the pictures that plastered every spare surface and then the walls.

Pictures of the Weasley's; pictures of Bill's wedding; pictures of Bill's baby; pictures of everyone. He finally came to the end where he saw pictures that he himself had. They were pictures of Harry and Ginny dancing at the wedding, or the picture taken just before Harry left for good. It was him sitting by the window, reading a book. He remembered clearly how Ginny had taken it without him knowing it, so his picture never looked up.

Finally, he saw pictures of a baby with giant brown/green eyes that smiled at him as she played in her pin, pictures of her on her birthday, pictures, pictures, pictures of the daughter her never knew. Then, he saw it. He frowned at the picture at the far end. It was of Annie as a baby, she was smiling her chubby baby smile as Harry approached. He knew about this one because it had been sent to him ten years ago in an unmarked envelope, not by owl but muggle post. He never knew what it meant. Now he did. It was a picture of Annie that had been sent to him a long time ago. That's why she had always seemed so familiar.

Harry turned around and walked out of the room, feeling guilty for even going in in the first place. He was silently yelling at himself when footsteps came down the stairs.

"-you idiot! Now there's jam all over our bed sheets!"

"If you would stop screeching at me for one minute I'll go and get my wand to clean it," Ron barked and came into view, shaking his head. Hermione let out a shriek when she saw Harry, making Ron trip on the last step and stub his toe. He let out a stream of curses, some that made Hermione slap him in the arm, and looked up at Harry. "Hey, mate," he said through clenched teeth.

"Harry! What are you doing here?" Hermione cried, looking at him as though he had grown a few heads, all of which were staring at her.

"I'm here for the Holidays!" Harry said, trying to sound as though her weren't extremely nervous. "I finally took my Christmas holiday."

"But-" Hermione stuttered, trying to think of a reason to send him back to Hogwarts immediately, "-what about the students?"

"Not a one of them stayed for holidays," Harry said, smiling at her. He suddenly realized, with a swoosh of the stomach and a shiver, that Hermione knew. She had to know. There was no other explanation for the fear in her eyes as she looked at him.

"Oh…but, surely you have WORK to do, don't you?" Hermione asked, twirling her hair.

"Nope," Harry said and she glared at him.

"Do Molly and Arthur know you're here?"

"No, Hermione, he snuck in," Ron said, holding onto her shoulders and forcing her to keep walking. "Now, let's go get that wand and clean up the jam. It's still early and the kids will be here any moment…"

"Alright," Hermione snapped and looked back at Harry, biting her lip.

OoOoOoOoOo

Meanwhile, Ginny and Annie were still talking.

"Mum, why didn't you just tell me?" Annie asked desperately.

"I wanted to be sure you could understand it," Ginny said softly.

"I would have," Annie protested angrily.

"I just don't want you to hate me," Ginny said, tears slipping out of her eyes. Annie turned to her sharply and sighed.

"Angry? Yes, very. Confused? Very. Slightly disappointed I wasn't told before I met him at school? Yes. Do I hate you? Never," Annie said, now holding her mother's hands. "I could never hate you."

"I'm just so sorry, Annie! It never seemed to be a good time and I didn't know what to say or how to say it or how you would react-"

"Mum, I think…"Annie sighed and started again. "I think you did the right thing. Maybe it would have been worse to know who he was. I missed having a father, sure, but it never got to the point where I would die if I didn't see him. I always thought that when I did meet him it would be because he wanted it, not because I was his student. Just…why did you wait?"

"His parents were dead, Sirius was dead, Dumbledore was dead, Ron was hurt, I was hurt, Hermione was hurt, everyone he loved was hurt and he blamed himself. He left me, not knowing I had you, because he thought a life with him would hurt me more then a life without him. I never told him I was pregnant because I realized he hadn't been free his entire life and telling him he had a baby would have made him feel chained again. He would have come back and he would have loved you with all his heart, but I didn't want him to. I wanted him to go out and be himself to have fun for once. He tried to get back in touch with me a little while ago but everything seemed so perfect now…maybe if you had voiced your need for a father I would have brought you to see him…" Ginny trailed off and let out a small sob.

"Does he even know who I am?" Annie asked. Ginny winced.

"Well…"

"HE DOES?" Annie burst out. "How long has he known?" Did he not want to see her? Did he not want her in his life?

"Like, a few months-"

"MONTHS?" Annie yelled, unable to keep the sound of voice down. She took a few steadying breaths and looked back over at her mother. "You told him?"

"No," Ginny said, "he figured it out. You do look so much like him…"

"This is weird," Annie said softly.

"I know," Ginny said, nodding.

"I mean, I've been calling my dad Harry Potter for my entire life," she said, frowning.

"He really wants to see you," Ginny offered. "Do you want to see him?" Annie thought for a moment. She nearly blurted out, "Of course I do!" but stopped herself.

"Yes," she said calmly. "I think I would like to see him sometime outside of school…"

"How about tonight at Christmas dinner?" Ginny asked. "He's probably at grandma and grandpa's-"

"Mum!" Annie bellowed, glaring at her mother.

"Whaaat?" Ginny asked.

"You already arranged something with him?" she snapped.

"Well…yeah-"

"You didn't even know I would say yes," Annie snapped.

"Well if you didn't then I would just say you weren't ready-"

"Oh, God!" Annie cried, rubbing her eyes. "Like that wouldn't have been awkward!"

"I'm sorry, alright!" Ginny cried. "I'm trying to make it right with us."

"You need some lessons in tact," Annie muttered and rubbed some dirt off her shoes. "I'm tired. I think I'm going to go sleep." She got up and walked past her mother, who stopped her.  
"Babe?"

"Yeah?" Annie asked, turning back to her mother.

"Are we good?" she asked. Annie stared at her mother long and hard and then her forehead smoothed out.

"Yeah," Annie said softly, "we're good." Ginny felt herself well up as her daughter went upstairs. Ginny got up, took out some parchment and quickly scratched a letter to Harry explaining what was happening. Maybe for the first time in a long time everything would go great.

A/N please read and review.


	10. The Kiss

Disclaimer-I don't own Harry Potter apart from a few choice characters. Wouldn't it be ace if I did?

* * *

Annie and Ginny stood outside the door and simply waited, not knocking or even talking to each other. It went on like this for ten minutes before Annie looked over at her mother.

"Mum."

"Yes?"

"I don't want to do this now," Annie said quickly. Ginny whipped her head around and stared at her daughter's pinched and worried face. "I can't. It's too fresh and weird and really, I don't want to do it in front of EVERYONE. Can you tell him to come by tomorrow or something? Make something up. You're good at that."

Ginny let the last comment fly by here without really thinking about it.

"Ok," she said reluctantly. "I'll tell him I couldn't do it when you had just come home and that I didn't want you mad at me tonight. I'll ask him to come over tomorrow and we'll talk about it then."

"Good," Annie said, knocking on the door. It opened almost immediately to reveal Molly Weasley holding a red, plastic cup filled to the brim with butter beer.

"Annie, Ginny! Oh, you're here! Let me see you. Too damn thin, Ginny, she's too thin! We'll just have to plump her up, now won't we? Come on in, everyone's excited to see you. Ginny, may I talk to you for a moment?"

"Sure, mum," Ginny said, nodding at her mother. She turned to Annie and handed her the shrunken presents and her jacket. "Here, dear, put these away for me, won't you?"

"Yes, mum," Annie said, absently scanning the room for familiar faces. She saw many old Order members whose faces didn't really ring a bell. Ever since the war ended the Weasley's Christmas party had been filled with random wizards from various times in her mother's life. There were always a few professors she had seen there but had never spoken too. As she did every year, Annie made a beeline for the stairs and took them two at a time as she headed for her cousin's and her room.

"There you are! I've been absolutely sick with worry you decided not to come!" Mia cried as soon as Annie opened the door and slammed it closed.

"Nope," she replied, brushing her hair back, "just stylishly late."

Mia made a face and plopped back down onto the bed with a low groan.

"These parties are the pits!" she cried, holding a hand up to her forehead. "Same people every year and not a single one of them gets more interesting as the years go by, you know! The only person who hasn't been coming here since 1999 was Harry Potter-"

"Harry Potter?" Annie squeaked, nearly falling off the bed she had so carefully perched herself on. Mia nodded, looking curiously at Annie's face.

"Yeah, why? Personally know him? I mean, mum and grandmum have been begging him for years to come to this and he's always said no and now he suddenly shows up unexpected-"

"He just showed up?" Annie repeated, she bit her lip and tugged at her dress.

"Yup, out of the blue like some…blue man or something."

"Interesting," Annie muttered. "Thirsty?"

"Sure, I could go for some butterbeer if you're bringing some back," Mia replied but Annie was already peeling out the door, hell bent on seeing him even just a glimpse.

Meanwhile, downstairs, Ginny was helping her mother load snacks into bowls and onto trays as the room filtered with the scent of baking cookies. As soon as Hermione turned and left the room, arms ladened with treats, Molly shut the door over and turned to her daughter.

"Ginny, dear, may I be blunt?"

"Like you've ever been something other than?" Ginny joked, wondering what her mother could possibly want. She was expected for anything. Anything except-

"Tell him and tell him now, while he's here," Molly said, leaning across the island and resting a warm, plump hand on her daughter's forearm. "He's gone in and out of your life now for so many years. I think it's time to finally just…do it. Just tell him."

"T-tell who?" Ginny said, trying to stop the world from slipping out from underneath her. Her heart was pounding, her hands began to sweat and she could see no way out of what her mother was saying. They all knew.

"Ginny, don't be daft. We both know what I'm talking about. Do me a favor and listen to an old woman's words." Ginny didn't interrupt and Mrs. Weasley continued. "He's going to be thirty-two years old this year, dear. He isn't going to wait his entire life for you. One day you're going to wake up and he's married with someone younger and prettier." Ginny frowned and tried not to burst into tears.

"How long-"

"Sweetie, I have always known," Molly said softly. "I knew it the moment you placed her into my arms and I knew it the moment she spoke. We all knew, dear, we just never said anything. That girl is living proof that Harry Potter would have lived on anyways."

Annie leaned against the door, her heart sinking terribly. Somehow, she couldn't shake the sense of being cheated out of her mind. In fact, in all truth, she had been cheated terribly all her life. She had never voiced this anger and pain at not knowing the father who abandoned her before she was born, she just felt that deep down in her heart of hearts, she should have had a father.

Now, she had a father. He was somewhere in this house, trying with all his might to forge a relationship with his daughter and the mother of his child.

In the living room, leaning against the fireplace, Harry and Ron were talking quietly to each other. The room was buzzing silently with the thought of Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley being in the same room at the same time. Not only that, Annie was here. Their daughter.

"How long have you known?" Harry growled, as Ron wiped butterbeer off of his face.

"About eleven years," Ron said and Harry swelled with rage.

"Never thought of, I don't know, saying something to me? The father?" Harry spat, taking a sip of butterbeer and trying to keep it down. His best friends had betrayed him in some distorted way.

"Hey, Potter, let's not play the blame game, eh? I couldn't because if Hermione or Ginny found out they would have to make a new word for what officials would find of me. Ginny would have tortured and killed me. Hermione would have dug me up and brought me back to life and start all over again."

"Selfish," Harry muttered. Ron rolled his eyes and bent down to pick up Lucy who had come over looking sleepy and incredibly bored.

"Daddy, can I go home?" she asked, smiling at Harry and then leaning against her father.

"Why don't you go ask Mia if you can sit with her. I think she was up with Annie-"

Harry spit his drink out again and began to cough harshly into his hand, his face turning a deep plum.

"Uncle Harry…are you alright?" Lucy asked uncertainly.

"Yeah, he's fine, toots, go see your sister," Ron said, placing her down and giving her a small push in the right direction. She went off, her small dress flowing against her legs. "Why do you think Ginny's here with Annie?"

"We were supposed to…you know," Harry said awkwardly.

"Now?" Ron asked. "She knows? Annie knows who you are?"

"I think so…I hope so," Harry said, shrugging. A though suddenly popped into his head, making him frown in thought. What if Ginny hadn't had the courage to tell her? What if she decided against it?

"Here she comes," Ron noted, slowly sideling away from Harry.

Ginny looked gorgeous, Harry noted. Her long red hair was half up, coming down to her breasts and flowing around her as she walked over. She had on a small black dress that came down above her knees with cap sleeves. Harry felt his face heat up as it always did when he saw her. He still loved everything about her. Her eyes, her smile, her mouth, her perfect nose that sat in between her eyes.

"Hello, Harry," Ginny said, coming over to him so close he could have easily bent down and placed a soft kiss onto her lips. Tempting as it was, Harry could only think of the effects it would cause. "Can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Sure," Harry said, finding his voice. He was dimly aware of the hush that fell over the room as they headed out towards the kitchen and finally outside onto the snow covered yard.

"There, that's better," Ginny said with a smile, "I was absolutely sweating in there. Plus, I think every single eye was on us a moment ago."

"Yeah, I can only imagine what they're saying in there," Harry said, involuntarily moving even closer to her without being aware of it. Her body hate was radiating over to him, almost beckoning him to her. "What did you want to talk about?" He was almost positive he knew what she was going to say. "You didn't tell her." It was a statement that he couldn't keep from flying from his mouth.

"No!" Ginny said. "I mean-yes, I did. She just…doesn't want it to happen tonight, in front of everyone. She wants to do it privately. She values that, her privacy. Reminds me of someone else…"

"So, when then?" Harry asked, almost impatiently.

"Tomorrow," Ginny offered. "We usually kick back and hang out at home after presents and we thought you could stop by and just talk together or something."

"She really wants me to?" Harry pressed.

"Yes, Harry she very much wants to see you. She's missed you a lot."

"So, how did she take it? Finding out who I really am?"

"She knew," Ginny replied softly. Harry's eyes widened.

"How long?" he asked, thinking back to all the uncomfortable classes they had had. He knew something was wrong with her, he was just unable to put it together.

"About a month after she got to school," Ginny replied. "She figured out the dates we dated, then just minused nine months from her birthday. I went into labor a bit early so it really didn't throw her off too much. She's a smart girl. I was foolish to think she would always be in the dark about it."

"She's known all this time?" Harry whispered. "She never let on…she never did anything to suggest she knew!" There was a moment of silence. "How was she? Was she angry?"

"No, actually," Ginny said, noting Harry's slight surprise, "she was the quintessence of calm. She talked to me in a clear, calm voice and never once screamed at me. It made me feel like such a bitch, I must say." Harry smiled slightly. "I can't believe how she took it though. I wouldn't have been that calm with mum…but she just listened to me without saying anything and then she said simply, 'I'm not very happy with you right now,' and that was it!"

"She's a great kid, Ginny. You did a great job with her," Harry said, moving even closer. Ginny didn't push him back as he expected, instead moved even closer herself. Harry felt his heart begin to beat harder then ever, his pulse began to pound into his ears.

"I've really missed you, Potter," Ginny said softly, her lips moving closer to his. Before he could stop himself, he bent down and kissed her hard on the mouth. Her cup dropped to the ground with a plop as she wrapped her arms around him and pressed him closer, trying desperately to fill the gaping hole that had been in her heart for eleven long years.

Harry couldn't believe what he was doing, what he had been wanting to do ever since he saw her that day in the Leaky Cauldron. He was still in love with her, no matter how much he denied it over the years, no matter how many women he had been with to fill that empty shell of a heart he had. He had been trying all these years to replace her when he knew no one could ever replace Ginny. And, now, he had a daughter to think about, he had to play this correctly. There was no leaving again.

Annie, Annie, Annie, think of Annie! Ginny screamed at herself. She couldn't pull herself away from him, though. She was afraid that as soon as she did he would be gone again in the blink of an eye as he so often was. She was afraid to let go and afraid to go on. Afraid she wouldn't be able to stop herself anymore.

Mia Weasley had come down for a drink. Her mother sent her out in the back to grab some ice for her drink. That's when she saw two people kissing in the moonlight. She squinted her eyes, feeling a presence next to her. She turned sharply and saw her brother also staring out towards the lake. Mia, at fourteen, wasn't a complete idiot, she knew what exactly they were doing and what they were probably thinking of doing.

"Who IS that?" she hissed at her brother. He squinted again. Suddenly, his eyes widened and he yanked his sister back into the kitchen.

"Mia, do you know who that is?" he whispered, looking seriously disgusted.

"Mom and dad-No, wait! Grandma and grandpa?" she cried, looking over and seeing both her mother and grandfather and deciding she had been wrong.

"No, stupid, that's aunt Ginny and Harry Potter!"

A/N Sorry it took so long, I was bed-ridden with illness. More soon though, my fingers haven't been stalling as their prone to do.


	11. The Photo Album

Disclaimer-Don't own anything J.K.R wrote, sad, but true.

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Ginny knew what she was doing was wrong, she could feel it deep down inside. They shouldn't be doing this, not now. She couldn't stop herself, it felt so right. This is what it should have been like. This is what all of her dates should have been like, but they hadn't. 

All Ginny could remember was stepping back into the shed by the lake, her back being pushed into the wall, her lips never leaving his. This want, this deep, unfathomable want was making her do things she never would have had the courage to do before. They both could feel it, this was what it should have been like.

She reached around his neck and pushed him closer to her, closing any distance that had threatened to burst through to them.

"Missed this," she muttered to him as she came up for breath. He grunted in reply and dragged the strap of her dress down around her shoulder, letting it slide off and down towards her elbow. Her breathing accelerated even more as he trailed a few kisses down her neck. Almost as a mechanical action her leg came up around him, pushing him closer to her body.

He reached underneath and dragged her underwear down, making her gasp again. He looked into her eyes, asking her permission, always the gentleman. She nodded once and heard the zipper of his pants come down as she anxiously waited.

Throughout the entire thing she couldn't stop thinking that this was what should have been. They should have been together with four other kids and a house outside the city with a cat and a dog who hated each other. It shouldn't be Ginny, alone, raising Annie who was probably never going to forgive her. They shouldn't have been apart for so long, they should have been together. A family.

It wasn't like all her other times. Before it was just something that eventually had to be done in a relationship, but now…this was what making love was. This is what it really felt like. This is the meaning of the word, what she was feeling now.

His hands gripped into her, his body stiffened, he whispered something in her ear and slowly their movements ceased to be made. She was still breathing heavily into his neck as he lowered her legs down, careful not to drop her as he feared he may just do throughout the entire thing.

Ginny felt her cheeks flame up with realization of what they had just done. Whatever friendship they might have been able to salvage was done, they had just altered it forever.

"Ginny," Harry said, stuffing something into her hand. She looked down and saw her carefully selected, lace panties clenched into her fist. Her cheeks flamed with embarrassment.She looked up into his eyes and saw nothing but the same old Harry that she had been used to.

"Harry, I-"

He silenced her swiftly with a kiss and she didn't know what to say. Was she sorry? Was he sorry? What was going to happen now? Annie-

Her entire body stiffened as a seeping cold swept into her. Ginny couldn't shake the feeling that she had betrayed her daughter somehow. It wasn't as though she had cheated on her husband, this was Annie's father.

"I'm not sorry," Harry whispered into her ear. Ginny suddenly remembered his newly founded skill that was picked up during the war. Occulemency.

Inside, Mia and Nathan were huddled in a short talk.

"Should we tell her, Nate?" Mia asked nervously. "I mean, is that embarrassing or something? I would be sooo embarrassed if mum was kissing Harry Potter outside for anyone to see.

"I don't know," Nathan bit his lip and thought furiously. "You can't say anything to anyone, Mia. I mean it, this is Annie and we can't do anything to-"

"I know that, you idiot," Mia snarled suddenly. "I was just asking whether or not we should tell her what we saw…I mean, I don't know-"

"Tell me what?" Annie asked from the doorway. She held a plastic cup in her small hand, her fist clenched around it.

"Mia told Lucy she could sleep in your bed tonight," Nathan said quickly, Mia glanced quickly over at her brother and then smiled at Annie, who relaxed instantly.

"Yeah, that's fine," Annie replied. "I'm not staying here anyways. Me and mum are spending tomorrow at home."

"Oh, yeah, you and your mum…" Mia said, earning a swift stamp on the foot from her brother. Annie frowned and felt as though, once again, someone was hiding something from her. When would it end?

Downstairs, Ginny silently walked back into the house, most of the wizards had filed out a while ago, leaving most of the family left, all chatting in the living room.

"Where were you?" Hermione asked as soon as Ginny came into the house, carrying her sweater in her hands.

"I went for a walk," Ginny mumbled, blushing deeply.

"A walk? At eleven at night? In that dress? When it's 20 degrees out?" Hermione asked skeptically. Ginny nodded.

"It was hot in here," Ginny said, trying to act cool. The door opened and Harry came in, smiled over at her and then went over to Ron who was talking to Bill. Hermione looked over at Harry then back at Ginny, who was walking away.

"Hey, Ginny?" Hermione asked. Ginny turned around and Hermione bent down and pulled her bra, which was sticking out from under her dress. "That was hanging out of your dress." She walked away and left Ginny feeling like a daft idiot.

OoOoOoOoOoOo

Annie and Ginny didn't arrive back home until two in the morning when they could finally convince a slightly tipsy Molly that they were exhausted. Annie didn't talk to Ginny the entire drive home, thinking about the weirdness that had come over her older cousins, the only ones she had ever been able to freely talk to.

As soon as they got home, Annie leapt out of the car and ran into the house and up the stairs. Ginny's throat clenched painfully and quickly wondered whether Annie had seen them…or if someone else had and instantly told her what they had seen.

"Annie?" Ginny asked, knocking lightly on Annie's door.

"Yes, mum?" Annie asked, letting Ginny know it was alright to walk into the room. Ginny did so and saw Annie sitting on her bed, nightgown on, book open in her lap.

"Is everything alright? You seem pretty quiet," Ginny asked, feeling the thudding of heart and wondering whether Annie heard it also.

"I'm fine, mum," Annie said with her usual smile. "Exhausted is all."

"Oh, ok…" Ginny said, standing up and going back over to the door. "I'll see you in the morning, sleep well. I love you."

"Mm, hmm," Annie mumbled and slipped under the covers, pretending to go to sleep. She heard the door click over and felt the sudden rage that almost always slipped into her before sleep. This time however, she had a reason.

At eleven years old, Annie wasn't an idiot. She herself had seen Harry and Ginny coming out of the shed and then the brief kiss they had shared before walking into the house. Annie had older cousins who weren't exactly in the running to be a saint and if she listened hard enough some summer's she usually heard things she could have gone a lifetime without knowing. She knew exactly what her parents were doing.

Do they really hate me this much? Annie thought furiously to herself. Do they really want to see me crack up? Because, really, that's what's going to happen.

Another part of her, the more rational part of her, remembered the love in her mother's eyes as she talked about Harry and they way she was when he had been around at the party. Maybe, finally, Annie was going to have a real family.

The next morning, Annie woke later then usual. She came down to see her mother making breakfast, another unusual for her. Annie knew her mother was feeling guilty, it was the only other reason for the piles of bacon and the pound of French toast sitting on the counter.

"Annie!" Ginny cried, rushing over and giving her daughter a short kiss on the forehead. "Merry Christmas, babe. C'mon, let's open some presents."

Annie was led into the living room where the Christmas tree was overflowing with presents from everyone in the Weasley family. One from her aunt and uncle in Egypt, another from Charlie in Romania, one from Percy and Penelope, the twins each sent presents and a card signed with four names, her aunt Hermione and uncle Ron sent her a gift, Marley and Alice sent her gifts.

At the end of the tree she saw a slender package wrapped in a simple red paper that felt thick to the touch. She frowned at it and slid it over to her, wondering what it could be.

"Mum, what's this?" Annie asked, showing it to her mother. Ginny had been opening presents herself from her mother and father and glanced up, squinting her eyes.

"I don't know…open it," she said, watching as Annie glanced at it once. She slowly slid her fingers under the paper, hearing the tape loosen with a swift pop. A smooth album slipped into her hands. "What is it?"

"I think it's a photo album," Annie whispered, more to herself then to her mother. She flipped a page open and saw her mother's familiar writing.

To Annie, it read, Something to get you caught up.

Annie glanced at her mother, curiosity written on her face.

"Mum, what-"

"Just open it," Ginny urged, coming closer, wrapping paper stuck to her knees. Annie looked back down and flipped another page over. It was a timeline in photos. There were some of Ginny as a child, some rare photos of Harry as a child, though he was in the background and some fat boy was in the center.

The later pictures showed one with a man in turquoise robes while Harry fought furiously to get out. There was one with uncle Ron puking slugs up all over his shirt while Harry and Hermione dragged him across the field. Then, there were some with Ginny and Harry together, really together. It looked as though they were at someone's wedding. Ginny was wearing a pink dress and white shoes as she danced slowly with Harry. Another picture showed Ginny with a sweatshirt on, hugging Harry tightly and a small arrow pointing to her stomach that said, in a small scrawl, Annie.

Annie was dumbfounded as she looked at other photos where her mother was pregnant, one of which Harry was still in. It would have been a few weeks before he left, but another arrow clearly said Annie. More pages filled with photos of Annie and Ginny, Annie and Molly, Annie and Arthur. And, finally, pictures of Harry and where he had been her entire life. Pictures of him reading the paper, looking up just in time to hear the click of the camera.

"Mum-" Annie whispered, looking at all the photos. "Where have these been?"

"Hidden away until I worked up the courage to tell you."

"Oh," Annie said simply.

An hour later, Ginny and Annie were eating their cold bacon and horrible French toast (Ginny wasn't much of a cook) when the doorbell rang. Annie gulped and felt her heart begin to beat, her hand begin to shake slightly.

"Is that him?" she asked.

"I think so," Ginny said, glancing at her watch. "Yeah, should be."

"How-how do we do this?" Annie asked.

"Do what?"

"This," Annie snapped. "This entire meeting. My God, this is awkward."

"I know," Ginny said, biting her lip. "Ok, we'll just answer the door and…and invite him in."

"Wow, I'm glad we got the hard parts all flattened out," Annie said sarcastically.

"My goodness, how does so much sarcasm fit into such a tiny body?" Ginny snapped, going over to the door and turning back to Annie. "Ready?"

Ready…

Was she ready? Could anyone really prepare for what Annie was about to do? She was about to see her father for really the first time. And, just to add the cherry onto the messed up sundae, she knew her parents had slept together last night.

"Yes," Annie heard herself saying.

The door opened and sunlight flooded the room.

"Harry," Ginny said pleasantly.

This is it, Annie thought to herself.

A/N Please read and review. I know, I know, I am dragging this confrontation out so long! It's because I have no idea how to write it. So, bear (did I use the right word there?) with me and let me work everything out. I'll probably update tomorrow, let's see if my muse can sprinkle some inspiration onto me tonight while I slumber.


	12. The Quidditch Game

**Disclaimer-Not Mine, Don't Own it.

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**Harry**

The house was just as it was last month. Same fern green shutters against the white boards. Same flowered pathway that led to the bright red door. Same pond in the back with lilies and goldfish. Everything was the same as it had been since I last saw it, except there was now snow covering the flowers, but it all felt differently.

I was going to officially be a father today. It seems stupid because technically I've been a father for eleven years, but in order to be a father you know to 1) know you're a father and 2) actually meet the child up close and not in front of twenty other students.

I wonder if she'll hate me as much as I hate myself right now. Why didn't I just come back like I'd planned? Why didn't I just realize I could have gone through the entire world and all I ever wanted was back home? Why couldn't I just get it? Get that Ginny was all I could ever want and she was what I needed. Why did I have to be such a big idiot?

I've been standing at the door for a half hour, unsure if I've come too early. They left at two and it was now two, which would have given them twelve hours of sleep. I wanted to give them time to open presents and talk and prepare for me. I also wanted to prepare myself.

How does someone prepare for this? I am about to knock on the door and step into someone's life. I am about to become apart of someone's life in a big way. Now I can't skip the country whenever I please and I can't drink and drink and drink until I pass out and wake up still drunk. I can't be a stupid, silly, immature boy anymore. I have to grow up and it has to occur within the next ten minutes.

What if she hates me and decides she's made a mistake, she doesn't need me in her life? What if I don't measure up to everything she's been dreaming about and what if Ginny and I can't work it out? Is it so bad for me to have these feelings for her? These big, recently satisfied feelings about her. Is it weird that I am in love with her? Unadulterated love for this woman who's a mother. Not only is she a mother, but the mother of my child. Is that really so bad?

How long can I stand here, staring at the door and the knocker wondering if any moment I'll get the surge of strength and knock? I could turn around, turn back and go back to school, quit and just leave. Never to worry about this. Never to worry that my daughter may suddenly decide she hated me. Never to worry that maybe Ginny and I are really over, despite everything that has happened. Could I bear it? Could I really be able to stay here, be a father to this girl and know that I may never be able to make it right?

I felt my hand reaching out, extending onto the red of the door. It slowly rose again and I felt my knuckles come down onto the hard surface, making a knock. The clatter of forks and the talking inside the house stops immediately and I know they're all waiting now.

Just, stay calm, you can do this. You talk to Lucy and you talk to Mia and Nathan on a daily basis. This is going to be so…so…

OoOoOoOoOo

"Harry," Ginny says, trying to smile at him. His face looks pale and worried. She tries to act comforting while not thinking about what happened last night, what they had done together. She gulped once and felt Annie in the background. "Won't you come in?"

Harry edged into the room, his heart beating his palms sweaty. He felt Annie's eyes one him and looked over at her. She was wearing a pair of jeans and a red and white sweater. Her long black hair was hanging around her shoulders; her eyes wide with anxiety.

"Hi," she said, unaware of what she was to call him. 'Sir?' 'Professor?' 'Dad?' 'Harry?' 'Professor Potter?'

"Hi," Harry said, also unaware of what to call her. Did she have a nickname or something that she was called at home? Was it simply 'Annie' or was it something else? He couldn't very well call her Miss Weasley, now could he? Well, he could, it just set the wrong tone.

"Um, Harry, why don't you sit down here and we'll get you some breakfast," Ginny suggested, shoving him hard into a chair. She left the room leaving a painful silence. Harry finally worked up the courage to break it.

"So, Annie, how you do you like Hogwarts?" he asked, setting down his cup of cold coffee.

"It's fine," she replied and squinted her eyes at him. "We don't have to do this, you know."

"Do what?"

"Mindless chit chat," she said, sitting down across from him. "We both know that we have some questions and that this awkward period will soon pass."

"Ah," was all Harry managed.

Ginny returned carrying a tray of wonderful smelling pancakes which had just been magically cooked. Harry was just wondering to himself whether Ginny's cooking had changed and become more, how to put it, edible, when Ginny smiled over at him.

"So, catch up?" she asked brightly, handing him some maple syrup.

Is this how it's going to be? Annie thought to herself. The awkwardness was getting almost unbearable; she really had nothing to say to Harry, she didn't know where to start. He hadn't been there for her in her entire life and the worst part was, it wasn't even by choice. They really missed out on something.

Had Harry chosen to leave and never turn back Annie could have yelled at him and banished him from sight for the rest of her life, never having to worry about him again. Had he been some part of her life, it may not have been so awkward. He wasn't there for her because Ginny never told him. It wasn't his fault that he wasn't there so Annie had no reason to be mad at him.

"Annie, I was actually wondering if you would like to go to a Quidditch game with me on Wednesday," Harry said, thinking of the extra ticket her bought just in case.

Annie's face suddenly broke out into a smile and Harry saw that her face changed with the blink of an eye and was now longer sullen and confused, but really an almost identical to Ginny. "Sure, I love Quidditch," Annie said, still smiling.

"Great," Harry said, suddenly thinking about whether or not he should have asked Ginny. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Harry thought to himself.

"That actually fits right in with my plans," Ginny said, "to go shopping and clean the house. What time is the game?"

"Four, and I thought maybe we could go to lunch before that," Harry said, looking back over at Annie who smiled again.

"Sounds great," she replied.

Soon, Annie wasn't sure how, conversation slowly filtered into the room as everyone's tension subsided. Ginny and Annie showed Harry around and the house and they showed him pictures from when Annie was little.

Stories old and recent were told. Harry told them about what he had been up to prior to their knowledge. Annie and Ginny shared stories that they were sure he wouldn't know about. Soon, it wasn't awkward anymore. It was just…different. It was different then talking to her mother or her uncles. It was different to not call him anything but Harry. She wasn't sure how school was going to go and she wasn't sure how their relationship would progress, but she knew that when it happened, when they finally got it, it would be fine. They would be just fine. And that was all Annie needed.

OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

"What am I going to wear?" Annie wailed, throwing around some clothes and charging into her mother's room, a panicked look on her face. "I have no clothes! This is all your fault!" She stomped out of the room, Ginny's hurried footsteps behind her.

"My fault?" Ginny snapped, toothpaste shooting out of her mouth. "How is this my fault?"

"Whoa, say it, don't spray it," Annie muttered, wiping off her face with her thumb. "Ugh, it isn't even the good kind either!" Ginny let out a growl and disappeared. She returned moments later, mouth empty.

"Now, how is this my fault again?" Ginny asked, placing a hand on her hip.

"You never buy me clothes!" Annie cried, gesturing to the rather small pile of clothes.

"You never ask," Ginny retorted.

"Well," Annie said, raising her chin, "now I am. So…now what?"

"What do you mean, 'now what'? Now nothing, babe. You find something in your closet to wear or, I don't know, Annie, I don't know!" Ginny stomped from the room. She suddenly came back carrying something. "Look what I found in my room that I forgot to give you. Open it. I think it's a shirt and jeans."

"Ruin it for me, why don't you," Annie muttered and tore the paper open. She glanced at the baby blue corduroys and the navy blue/baby blue sweater and smiled at her mother. "Thank Merlin for minor miracles." She slammed her door over and dressed quickly, opening it and modeling for her mother.

"Nice," Ginny said, "very stylish."

"Thank you."

There was a moment of silence and Ginny came over to Annie and placed her hands on her shoulders. She smiled brightly.

"We'll start a new chapter in our lives, Ann," Ginny said. "No more secrets, no more lies. The truth from here on out. I will not keep anything from you anymore."

"Great!" Annie said. "So do you want to tell me why you and Harry were in the shed on Christmas Eve for forty-five minutes?"

Ginny gaped at Annie opened mouthed for a minute.

"Wh-How-What?"

"Yeah, I and who knows who else saw you go in and then saw you come out again with your dress all wrinkled! I'm not an idiot mother, I know exactly what you were doing in there and I'm pretty sure everyone else knows too! Thanks for embarrassing me once again!"

"Oh," Ginny whispered, her cheeks bright red, "Annie, I'm sorry! I really am sorry! I'm really sorry we did that!"

"Was it bad?" Annie asked.

"Annie!" Ginny screamed, looking abashed.

"What?" Annie asked, shrugging. "Carrie said you should only apologize if it's bad." Ginny still looked flabbergasted. "What? She told me that day I got my ears pierced."

"When did you get your ears pierced?" Ginny snapped, grabbing her head. "Oh, Annie! I thought we said that I would do it later and-Oh, oh! Don't try and change the subject."

Annie rolled her eyes.

"I don't want you talking like that! Especially about…"

"Sex," Annie prompted.

"Yes," Ginny said, "and shh."

"Mum, I'm almost twelve! I understand that kind of stuff!"

"Is it time we had the talk?" Ginny said, suddenly looking frightened.

"About?"

"Sex, Annie, sex!"

"Mum! I don't want to talk about that with you!"

"Well, you need to know this stuff, Annie, to be safe."

"Don't you think it's a little hypocritical for you to be telling me about safe sex? You got pregnant."

"Hey! I thought we agreed that it wasn't too bad, eh? I had you, my darling daughter." Ginny cupped her face and kissed her cheek. "Let's get downstairs. Your dad will be here any moment." She turned back to Annie. "Your DAD will be here any minute."

"It's weird," Annie agreed, stopping for a moment. "I mean I actually have a father now. And a mother. All we need is a dog."

"We could get a dog," Ginny said, smiling. "We could name him Fido."

"Fido?" Annie asked, crinkling her nose. "I was thinking Cooper. Cooper the Pooper. Catchy, eh?"

Ginny laughed as they entered the kitchen.

"Do you want me to make you something? I could whip something up. I mean…pancakes?"

"It's almost two, mum," Annie said, smiling at her mother. "Do you feel left out about this? Me going off without you…We could all go."

"No," Ginny said suddenly, smiling again. "I think it's best just you and your father go and get accustomed to each other."

"I like how we keep calling him 'My Father' or 'Your Father' instead of Dad or Harry."

"I know," Ginny said, scrunching up her nose. There was a knock on the door and Annie went to answer it. Harry stood there, still looking nervous.

"Hey, it only took you fifteen minutes to knock this time," Annie said, getting her coat. "Kiss me, mum! We're leaving."

"C'mere, Annie! Here-" Ginny ran a comb through her hair and it suddenly looked shinier then it did a moment ago. Harry was once again struck in awe of the bond these two people shared. "Hey, Harry." She smiled at him, a smile he recognized, a smile only he received. "You get her back in one piece."

"I'll try," he said, still smiling at her. She felt a blush coming to her cheeks, still remembering that night in the shed, the heat that had radiated off of them, fogged the windows. Now everyone, including Annie, knew what had happened. "I was thinking maybe before Annie goes back to school we could all go somewhere."

"Sounds great," Ginny agreed. "Let me know the details and we'll be there."

"Ok," Harry said, "ready Annie?"

"Yes," Annie said, checking to make sure she had everything she might need. She was a compulsive packer and tended to make billions of scenarios and make an excuse to take everything in her room with her. She had even managed to convince her mother that taking an extra skillet would have helped them greatly on their camping trip, and it did! They were able to use the other one as an umbrella after the tent caved in with rain.

They walked over to his car and Annie stared at it with slightly anxiousness. She took in the freshly washed look, the clean smell of the seats and turned to her father.

"You can drive…right?" She couldn't get the picture of her mother swerving around the woman out of her mind. Harry looked at the car and back at Annie.

"Yeah, of course I can!" he said, feeling hot around the neck. Today had been the first time in years that he had actually driven a car. "Get in."

Annie slid into the seat and glanced around with interest. Her mother's car was old and slightly banged up, but Harry's was brand new. The side shined, the mirror twinkled with afternoon light, the wheel looked as though no one had touched it ever.

"Is this a new car?" Annie asked, running her hands along the sides.

"Well, not exactly," Harry said, turning to key in the engine, "I bought it a few years ago just in case and it has just sat in Ron and Hermione's garage since then. I figured we could just drive to the restaurant then to the site and use a Portkey to get to the game."

"Great," Annie said, smiling at Harry and looking out the window at the scenery passing by. Harry looked over at her every so often, wondering what he should say.

"So, do you like school?" he asked, knowing full well he had already asked this.

"Yeah, it's great," Annie said enthusiastically. "I especially like Potions."

"Potions?" Harry asked, looking over at her oddly. "With Professor Snape? That Potions class?"

"No, the Potions class taught by John Lupin on the sixth floor. The one where everyone takes a deep breath over a bowl and feels very silly for a couple of hours." The car swerved violently, missing what Annie was hoping was an already dead cat. "I'm sorry, I was kidding!" she cried, holding onto her heart.

"No, it's alright, I'm sorry." Harry felt himself smile. She had the Weasley sense of humor. "I just have to get used to the fact that you're kidding sometimes. You're a lot like your mother, you know. You two kid a lot and sometimes people don't know you're kidding."

"That's what Grandma says," Annie said. "She gets really ticked when mum says something at the dinner table that is considered inappropriate."

"Like what?" Harry asked, interested.

"Well, one night she asked if mum was seeing anyone new, this is always a sore spot between mum and Grandma, so mum said yes," Annie explained, her face breaking into a smile. "So Grandma asked what his name was and mum said Ben Dover." The car swerved again and Harry looked over to see if she was kidding, her face told him she wasn't. "Of course, Grandma didn't know she was kidding, even though Ron had spit out his water and the twins nearly cracked a rib trying not to burst into laughter. So, Grandma asked, 'Ben Dover…sounds like a good chap. Do you like him?' And mum said, 'Well, he's alright, kind of a push over,' and by the time I thought uncle Ron was going to pop a blood vessel. Grandma still didn't get it. This went on for about five minutes until Bill whispered what it meant. She got all red in the face and excused herself. When we went to leave we found out she towed our car."

Harry was blown over and couldn't speak for a moment.

"Molly used a phone?" he finally asked.

"Oh, yes! She uses it quite a lot now," Annie said, nodding. "She says as long as it doesn't kill her, what harm can it do? They were going to install actual plugs into the house, but Grandpa stuck a paper clip into the socket. Ron had to go out and buy protectors to keep Grandpa from doing it again."

Harry tried not to laugh at the thought of Mr. Weasley sticking his finger into a socket like a two year old. Instead, he looked back over at Annie who was smiling and looked out the window.

"You know, your middle name is my mother's middle name," Harry offered. "Ginny said that's why she chose it."

"Really?" Annie said, nodding to herself. "Mum said if I was a boy she was going to name me Heraldo."

Harry chose not to comment.

After lunch they quickly headed out to a small town that seemed to be simply buzzing with excitement.

"What are they all happy about?" Annie inquired as they walked towards town. Suddenly she realized every eye was on them. "Oh, it's because you're Harry Potter! I see!" Harry felt hot in the face again. "Where is the field?"

"About another five minutes," Harry muttered, feeling hundreds of eyes on him. He suddenly spotted a face that couldn't have been more unwelcome at the moment. "Oh, no," he whispered. Annie looked around and saw a woman walking over, dressed in a lime green suit.

"Harry Potter! Fancy seeing you here!" Rita Skeeter couldn't believe her luck. She had been shunted around from position to position ever since that filthy Hermione Granger let slip what Rita had done. Now however, she was standing in front of Harry Potter. "And who's your little friend?" Her eyes widened with realization and shock. She hadn't been aware that Harry Potter had been a child.

Annie glanced at the woman in confusion. She looked like a bad breed of beetle and poodle. Harry stiffened incredibly as he too realized what Rita had.

"Nice to see you, Rita. Excuse me, I must get going."

"Yes, yes, of course! You go on ahead!" she waited until Harry was almost out of earshot before she grabbed Annie's arm. "I don't believe we met. I'm Rita Skeeter. What's your name?"

"Anna," Annie replied. "Anna Linjection."

Harry smirked and took her firmly by the shoulder, watching Rita's scowl deepen. He knew it didn't matter, his picture would be all over the front page tomorrow.

"Who WAS that?" Annie asked incredulously.

"That was Rita Skeeter," Harry replied, ushering them up to their seats. They climbed for a while until they reached a giant box already filling with people. "Alright, here we are. I got four top box tickets for my birthday one year from Remus-you know Remus- so I use them from time to time or give them out as presents."

"Wow! These are ace seats!" Annie breathed, leaning over to railing to see as far down as she could. Harry smiled and took something out of his pocket.

"Here, try these," he said. He had found his old Binoculars in the trunk at home. He hadn't even remembered about them.

"Oh, wow!" Annie said, looking into them. Harry was just thinking that she was probably watching the game when he heard: "Oh, my God! That's mum's boss picking his nose!" Harry made a face and took a look for himself and saw the man Ron had saw almost eighteen years ago. He laughed.

"So it is," he replied, watching Annie scan the rows of people. He was getting antsy, fearing she may suddenly fly right over the edge, when he heard another familiar voice.

"Ah, Potter, fancy seeing you here."

Harry whipped around and came face to face with Draco Malfoy. Ever since the war ended and Draco finally did something useful and gave them correct information, there had been a tense truce between the two.

"Yes, well, can't get too much Quidditch in one lifetime, can you?"

"I suppose not," Malfoy replied, smiling a very rare smile. "I'd like you to meet my son, Miles."

"Hello, I believe you have my class."

"Yeah, it's great. Really. I'm not just saying that," Miles said, looking over at Annie with mild recognition. Malfoy's gaze soon fell on Annie who was flipping through the program.

"Oh, er, I'd like you to meet my d-" He stopped. Was it daughter yet? Should he just come out with it? Could he trust Malfoy? This is Malfoy, same boy who promised to kill Dumbledore. "My daughter. My daughter, Annie." Annie looked up from her article and smiled at Malfoy, glared at Miles. Malfoy seemed shellshocked for a moment, recovering slowly.

"Hello," she replied easily.

"Hello."

Miles simply glared at her. They hadn't liked each other since first day when he had been tossing an ink bottle around with his friends and it smashed into her head. If Harry was being honest to himself, it was almost like James and Lily's relationship all over again.

"Game's starting," Annie said, now looking excited. She smiled over at him. "Thanks for taking me…dad."

Harry felt paralyzed. Dad. She had called him dad. And why shouldn't she? He is technically her dad and supposedly that's what kids call their fathers. He had never expected her to say it to him, though.

The nervous feeling he had been waiting for never arrived. Instead, he smiled over at her and signaled for the slushy man. This could finally be the start of something really fantastic.

A/N Please read and review. And really, four days is not a long time. My muse was off visiting someone else this past week.S


	13. The Newspaper

Disclaimer- same as always.

* * *

Annie sat back in her seat and watched as the game went on. So far, her team, or Harry's team, was losing pitifully, much to Harry's dismay. Try as he might he couldn't stop a few curses from slipping out of his mouth, much to the amusement of Annie. 

"No! What are you doing?" Harry bellowed with the crowd, growing frustration building inside of him. "Oh, come on you stupid son of a b-" He broke off with a look at Annie. His cheeks grew hot and he turned back to the game. Right, he told himself, I'm a father now. Father's don't swear in front of their children. He chewed on a fingernail, furious with the ref down below. His mouth had stayed clamped closed until the ref who, in Harry's opinion was a biased jerk, made another uncalled for foul. "What game are you looking at you dumb asshole? Get your eyes back on the fucking game!"

There was some silence as Harry looked over at Annie who noisily sipped from her empty slurrpy cup. Harry smiled awkwardly.

"You kiss my mother with that mouth?" Annie quipped, her amused face making Harry feel idiotic. She must think he's a loud drunk who can't control himself.

"I'm sorry," Harry apologized, "I just get really-No!"

Suddenly the entire top box filled with cries of outrage at another foul that had been called. Harry flopped back into his seat with an angry snarl. He reached into his pocket and extracted a cigarette from the box. He put it to his lips and reached back into his pocket for the lighter.

"What're you doing?" Annie asked, suddenly looking angry.

"What?" Harry asked, unaware that he had even backtracked to his bad habit.

"Smoking kills, don't you know that?" Annie snapped, snatching the cigarette out of his mouth and dropping it onto the ground, her blue boot crushing it down. "You should really quit. It makes your breath smell, it makes your teeth yellow and they'll have to cut a hole into your throat when you get emphazyma. Then if you're lucky the least that'll happen is you'll get bladder cancer and they'll have to stick a tube somewhere you don't want it just so that you can pee. Then, after you've suffered for a bit, you'll die."

Harry watched her in stunned silence before shaking his head once.

"Where did you learn all that?" he asked.

"Aunt Hermione told me," Annie replied. "She wouldn't want you to smoke either. In this day and age I should think someone smart enough to save the world would know not to smoke. It's stupid and you don't look cool and you cut your life time in half. You just think about that."

Harry felt another angry tingle run through him. He was not going about this fathering thing the way he should be. Smoking was out, Annie didn't seem to like it much and in fact he didn't like it that much either. Harry probably would have quit a while ago if it hadn't been so damn addictive. Now, however, there was a perfectly good reason to quite smoking. His daughter.

Once again the thought petrified him. His daughter. Annie was his daughter. He was a father to someone. Annie would now say, "This is Harry Potter, my father." He would be her father from now on. There was no changing it. He was a father.

"Is the ref blind or something?" Annie asked, jolting him out of his thoughts. "That was in no way possible a foul. Unless of course McDoogle has telepathy and shot that ball towards the ref. That would be a foul."

"He's always favored any team against this side of Europe," Harry explained. Annie's eyes widened and she smiled.

"Why?"

"Well, he used to be on a team for Ireland and they kicked him off when someone younger, better looking and slightly more better playing came along," Harry said. "Now, if a team on this side plays against any other team, he's a complete biased pig."

"Hmm," she said thoughtfully. A moment later the half time show began, much to Annie's amusement. Harry surveyed the field warily and felt a sudden jolt when he realized what, or rather who, was performing. How could he have forgotten that they would be performing? Bill was married to one of them for Pete's sake.

"Oh, dear," Harry muttered as Annie kept her eyes on the field. As the dancers began to dance, she raised an eyebrow at the field.

"Are they, like, strippers or something?" she asked, turning to Harry slightly, still looking at the field.

"Hmm?" Harry mumbled, trying to fight the embarrassing urges he was suddenly faced with.

"Strippers," Annie said louder. "Dance around poles with string for underwear…usually have more sexually transmitted diseases than a toilet seat in London." Harry colored slightly and looked over at Annie incredulously.

"Does your mother know you talk that way?" he snapped.

"Probably," she replied evasively. "It wouldn't be wise to mention it to her, though. It may squash her image of the perfect mother she aims so be. Her only flaw is that sailor trash talk that streams out her mouth most of the time. You should hear her. It's quite funny to listen to."

Harry didn't say anything and decided to take the safest route, looking back at the game, only to see another foul be awarded to his team. Annie shook her head slowly and slurped down another slurrpy. Harry looked back over at her and smiled widely when she cursed the ref.

Two hours later, after much overtime and a very close call, Harry's team lost 752-4, which Annie said wasn't too bad. They could have lost by nothing.

"Are you hungry?" Harry asked as they pulled out of the lot from the deserted parking place. Annie nodded quickly.

"Famished," she said, making a big deal and rubbing her stomach. "I haven't eaten anything in ages!"

"Besides a hot dog, some chips, an ice-cream cone and four cartons of popcorn," Harry muttered. Annie looked over at him.

"That isn't real food!" she said in disgust.

"Oh, and what, exactly, are you hungry for, dare I ask?"

"I don't know," she said as though he were daft, "pizza or something?"  
"You just had pizza! How can you even eat after all of that junk you just consumed? I'm sick just thinking about it," he said, giving his stomach a comforting rub. Annie sighed.

"It's simple, really," she said. "I just eat so much that that small dent I just made in my stomach is still waiting to be filled…by steak."

"Steak?"

"Yes," Annie replied, "with ketchup."

"Ugh," Harry groaned, trying to block the picture from his mind. Annie giggled into her hand and then looked out the window at the scenery. It look incredibly different in the setting sun. "So, do you like that Malfoy boy?"

In the time it took Annie to turn around and glare at Harry, he could already tell that he should have used a different method for asking. Coming out bluntly and asking was not going to help him in the slightest. Especially when he saw Annie's disgusted face.

"No!" she cried. "Why would you think that?"

"Well," Harry said awkwardly, "you guys seemed to get on each other's nerves and I just thought-"  
"Oh," Annie said knowingly, "you just figured it was one of those 'stick gum in your hair, push you down in the playground' kind of hatred."

"Erm," Harry mumbled, feeling himself begin to blush, "yeah."

"Well, it isn't," Annie advised him in a stern tone. "I really don't like him at all. The thought makes me sick, as it would do to him. He smashed an ink bottle against my head and from then on out we have a mutual hatred." Apparently Harry still didn't look convinced because Annie flared up again. "Do I ever ask you if you're secretly crushing on Snape? Or Mr. Malfoy? Or Kreacher the House-elf in school you told me you hate so much? Have I ever questioned the fact that maybe you just hate somebody? Just because I am at an age where the new thing is having a boyfriend or getting a crush, doesn't mean I am! I do not like Miles Malfoy."

There was a stunned silence for a moment, broken only by Harry mumbling, in an embarrassed tone, "Oh, ok."

"I mean he tucks his shirt into his underwear for cripes sake!" Annie burst out shaking her head angrily. "Who does that?"

"Well," Harry said ten minutes later, "it's good you don't like him. Bad student. Didn't even bother to hand in his essay before break."

**The next day**

The next day, much earlier than Annie would have liked, she was woken by her mother's hysterical shouting from down in the kitchen. Annie, thinking that there must be some sort of attack going on downstairs, came down, weapon in hand.

"Mum?" she called cautiously. "Mum?"

With a thump, Annie was knocked onto the ground, her mother on top of her. For a moment she was completely immobile with confusion.

"What has gotten into you?" she hissed furiously.

"Shh," Ginny barked. Annie did so. "Do you hear that?"

"No," Annie said, only to stop when she did in fact hear what Ginny was talking about. It was the sound of many, many mumblings from outside of the house. "Who's outside?" she hissed.

"Reporters," Ginny muttered back. "Now where did I put my wand-"

"Why are there reporters outside of our house?" Annie cried, trying to look up from underneath the table.

"Because of this-" Ginny threw something into Annie's lap.  
"Oh, no," she said, coloring with embarrassment.

There, on the front page in large, spirally letters were:

Harry Potter Has a Daughter!

Underneath it was Annie's picture with Harry from yesterday, not to mention many from the walk to the car and otherwise. There were also pictures of her house, not to mention the Burrow.

"Did your father do this?" Ginny asked furiously as one of the reporters climbed onto the trelace and attempt to photograph them crouched under the table. With a zap of her wand, found under the knocked papers, Ginny closed the curtains and finally allowed Annie up from under the table.

"Will everyone see this?" Annie asked, feeling the color in her cheeks become deeper and hotter.

"Anyone who gets the paper," Ginny said distractedly. Annie bowed her head and saw, in the corner of the page, "SOLD TO OVER THREE MILLION SUBSCRIBERS!" and groaned loudly. She began to flick through the pages silently and let out a yelp when she saw a picture of Harry and Ginny together, what look like last night.

"Mum," Annie said sweetly, "where did you go after I fell asleep last night?"

"Me?" Ginny asked nervously, snapping her head up from under the kitchen sink. "Me? I didn't go anywhere. Whatever do you mean?" Ginny tried to get a look at the paper as Annie danced out of reach.

"Well," Annie went on, "it says that you and Harry Potter, your alleged boyfriend, I might add, were spotted talking outside of the restaurant around the corner."

"Oh, that's ridiculous," Ginny said with a snort. "I was here the entire time-"

"There's a picture."

"Oh," Ginny said, coloring. "Well, then yes I was with him!"

"And lying about it so wonderfully," Annie said sarcastically. "Mum, are you dating him? Really?"

"Well…"

A/N Please read and review.

Sorry I haven't been updating but I had writer's block and then I decided to take a much needed break and devoted myself solely to school (meaning no computer or t.v.) and then I just couldn't sign on and submit a story, so that's why it's been a while.

And, at the risk of sounding completely rude and something else ( I can not locate the word I'm looking for) please don't review complaining to me. I am stressed and am in no mood to read about people complaining and insulting me for either not updating, or my story load. I can not stress this enough. You are not obligated to read my stories, nor do you have to review. People getting angry and reviewing about how I am not that great of a writer and that I will not get away with making new stories really just piss me off. If you don't like me or the way I update and whatnot then do not read my stories and do not review telling me how angry it makes you feel because quite frankly I have my own problems and can not worry about every single person who reads my stories. And, just for the record, I am not saying I only want good reviews, bring on the nit pickers and flamers, I'm just saying I don't appreciate it.

Well, for those of you who decided to read to the bottom of the bitching rant, I am back out of hibernation and have ideas and writing prompts for all of my stories. Maybe there'll be an update. I can't be sure, fingers crossed.


	14. The End

Annie was sitting no her bed, pretending her mother wasn't downstairs furiously thinking of ways to apologize to her. So, she had once again lied to her, making her life even more complicated. So Ginny and Harry had their affair spread over three pages in a paper read by the entire Wizarding world. So Annie was going to go back to school with all of this hanging over her head. So what? Right? It shouldn't really matter that much, though it did.

For as long as she could remember she and her mother had a pretty good relationship. Annie had never felt as though she couldn't go to Ginny with her feelings. Suddenly, everything changed. Ginny, who had once told Annie almost everything, was sneaking around behind her back sleeping with Harry, secretly dating.

"Annie?" There was a soft knock on the door. "Can I come in?"

"I'm trying to sleep, mother," Annie replied coldly, scooting down until she was in a laying position. "Maybe when I wake up. That should give you plenty of time to make up a story." There was silence. Annie wondered if maybe she had gone too far, but then decided she didn't care.

"Annie Elizabeth, open this door right now!" Ginny called, knocking harder. Annie didn't reply, too furious to really even look at her mother. "Annie!"

"Mum, why can't you just leave me alone?" Annie cried. "I don't want to talk to you, I don't want to see you, and I certainly don't want to hear another one of your excuses. Please just go away!"

Ginny stared at the door in shock. Annie had never spoken to her like that before, never. She felt tears well up in her eyes and slowly turned away from the door, heading back down to the kitchen where Harry was sitting, waiting for her.

"Well?" Harry asked, as soon as Ginny walked in. She shook her head and bent it down, swiping tears away from her eyes, trying to prevent Harry from seeing them. "Oh, that bad, huh?"

"I think she hates me!" Ginny wailed, putting her head in her hands. "I just think I've made the biggest mistake of my life! She's never going to get over this."

"Of course she will," Harry said. "She loves you, Ginny. As far as I can see you've made a great home, and a great life for this girl! Alright, so you lied to her and you concealed the identity of her father-" Ginny let out another wail. "-but you know Annie. Does she seem like the type of person to hate you forever?"

"I don't know…" Ginny replied. "I didn't think so…"

"Don't worry about it," Harry replied, kissing the top of Ginny's head. "Everything is going to work out, Gin, I promise."

"Yeah?" Ginny asked, looking up at him.

"Yeah."

**One Year Later**

Harry huffed angrily as he slid a box into it's appropriate place by the window. He surveyed it for a moment as Annie watched from the door, confused.

"What're you doing?" she asked, handing him some Windex.

"Does that look alright there?" he asked critically.

"The box?"

"Yes."

"Erm, sure. The box looks great in our living room, under our window."

"Great," Harry said happily, squinting and snapping his fingers at it. It suddenly transformed into a giant drum set, which he quickly bounded over to and started playing. Annie jumped, unaware that that would make such a loud noise. Ginny, also curious as to what was causing all the noise, came out of the kitchen.

"Harry, what on Earth is that?" she asked, staring at it.

"My drums!" Harry called.

"Your what?"

"My drums!"

"What?"

"HIS DRUMS!" Annie bellowed.

"Oh," Ginny nodded, staring at them quizzically. In fact, she was wondering how on Earth she was going to make it look like an accident when she broke them. "Annie, want to help me with some lunch?"

"Yeah," Annie replied, "sure." She followed her mother into the kitchen and reached in the cabinet to get the pitcher. "So, mom…let me see the ring again."

Ginny excitedly held out her hand for Annie, who sighed over the ring. It had been no shock to her that Ginny and Harry had gotten engaged, nor that Harry was moving into their home. All in all it was a pretty good understanding between the three of them.

"Here, go give this to him," Ginny said dryly, handing Annie the glass of lemonade. Harry began beating upon the drums again, this time louder and faster. "Oh, how are we going to break those?"

"I don't know…" Annie said, trailing off. "I was thinking we could just hide the sticks."

**One Year Later**

Annie brushed out her long black hair as her mother rushed around in the background. They were quiet today, most likely from nerves.

"And the band?" Hermione asked, walking into the room. Ginny looked up at her, a worried look on her expression.

"Noon," she replied.

"And it's?" Hermione asked furiously, looking down at her watch. "Eleven forty-five. They should be here in fifteen minutes. Is the stage prepared for that?"

"Yes," Annie replied, trying to smile at her aunt, whosePMS hormoneswere currently flying out at innocent bystanders. For example, Mr. Zamirir, who ran the muggle market on the corner. Hermione had yelled at him for his lack of apples until he called the police, who refused to arrest her because of her "slanderous comments about him, his apples, and the way he ran his business."

Hermione wheeled around to stare at Annie. "Who did you hair?"

"I did," Annie replied. "I was going for a natural look of brushing it."

"I thought we decided it was going to be up," Hermione accused through narrowed eyes.

"No, Hermione, dear, you decided it was going to be up, I decided as it was my wedding that it could be any way she wanted it to be…Remember?" Ginny said firmly. Hermione flushed slightly and nodded. She turned to Annie, beaming.

"Dear, your hair looks absolutely lovely!" she cried, bringing Annie and Ginny into a hug. "Just think, it only took you guys fourteen years to come together."

"Yes, fourteen years, one child, several lies and a big blow out," Ginny added.

"Don't forget the pear tree," Annie quipped sarcastically. "I'm going to go downstairs and get my dress. It's still hanging up in the kitchen, right?"

"Yes, dear, beside the stove," Ginny said.

"Because that was the smartest place to put it," Annie muttered, leaving the room. She walked along the hallway, past her bedroom, then to the stairs. Everywhere she looked there were decorations for the wedding, which was starting in an hour. She paused at the stairs, allowing her eyes to sweep over the living room and the beginning of the kitchen.

Bows and streamers hung from the ceiling, or attached the chairs, which had replaced the couches and overstuffed arm chairs. Annie sighed heavily, wondering just how much her life was going to change.

She was happy, of course, that her parents were going to get married today. There was no reason not too, really. This was what she had wanted since she had found out that Harry was her father. She was cautious, however, as to how much her life was going to change. So far Harry had moved in with his muggle drum set, which he insisted on playing at odd hours. There was his muggle game system, which he taught Annie how to play. Also, his dog, Pete, who Annie adored among everything she owned. He was an overweight chocolate lab which gorgeous brown eyes.

It was overwhelming, to say the least, about everything that was happening. She had to come to terms with the fact that there was a man living in her house. She had been embarrassed for one of the first times in her life to get her period on the one day Ginny had left her alone with Harry. She had been so freaked out, as her mother had not quite told her what to expect, that she had started screaming. Harry had come in, asked her what was wrong, and when she told him, blushed more than she had ever seen him, and left. Ten minutes later her mother rushed in, face flushed, eyes shining because her baby had finally become "a woman."

Just last night Ginny had allowed Annie to stay up all night with her as they sat and talked by the fire. Annie had finally asked what she had been wondering about for months.

"_Mum," Annie asked curiously as they ate their sundaes. _

"_Yes, dear?" Ginny asked, wiping some peanut butter off of her chin. She turned to Annie with a giant, goofy smile on his face. _

"_Do you think you'll have any more children?" Annie asked quietly. "I mean, you and dad are getting married now. It's finally the appropriate time to have a child…will you?"_

_Ginny's smile slowly faded off her face as a confused expression replaced it. "I don't know, dear, I really don't." Ginny sighed. "I want more children. I would love to have two or three more…but it's really all about what is going on in our lives. I know you're father wants more, but you never know."_

"Annie?" Annie whipped around and there he was. Her father was standing in the kitchen, everything on but his jacket. He gave her a giant smile and took a sip from his tea cup. "Do you need something?"

"My dress," Annie replied. "I need my dress." She walked over to the stove and took her inky purple dress off the hanger and turned to face her father. "I'm going to get dressed."

"Hey, wait," Harry called, walking over to her. He looked down at Annie and tried to calm his nerves. "Have a toast with me."

"A toast?" Annie asked.

"Yes, I'll even put some champagne in yours," Harry said, giving her a sideways smirk. Annie happily went over and accepted the glass.

"To you and mom," Annie said taking a sip as she clinked the glass together with Harry's. "Mmm, this is tasty."

"Yeah…let's not let Ginny know you've had this…," Harry said worriedly, watching her down it in one gulp. She let out a belch just as Hermione walked in.

"Oh, charming," she said sarcastically. "What're you drinking over here?"

"Orange juice," Annie replied immediately. Hermione frowned and took out a glass for herself.

"Annie, you need to go get dressed…like ten minutes ago," Hermione said shooing her out of the kitchen. "You'll see Harry in like twenty minutes…go! Now!"

"Yes, auntie," Annie replied, taking down her dress and hurrying up the stairs to her mother's room. She knocked on the door and slipped in as her mother was just putting on her veil. "Wow."

"I know, right?" Ginny said, smoothing down the dress. "I look…amazing."

"Right," Annie said. "Mum, you look angelic."

"Aw, that's sweet, honey." Ginny turned to Annie with a giant smile on her face. She couldn't stop herself from smiling. "Are you sure you don't want to come with us when we go to France?"

"Yeah, positive," Annie replied sarcastically. "As if I want to go with you on your honeymoon! I'll stay with Marley."

"Yes, if that's what you want," Ginny said innocently. "Especially since You-Know-Who will be there."

"No he won't," Annie replied. "Dad killed him thirteen years ago." Ginny rolled her eyes.

"I mean a certain boy that you've had your eye on-"

"Mum!" Annie cried. "Who told you?"

"I'm your mother, Annie! Don't you think I know when you're in love?"

"Well…you shouldn't!" Annie cried, feeling her cheeks heat up incredibly. Ginny let out a short laugh before going over to Annie and hugging her. Annie found herself thinking about how Elliot had kissed her just before they boarded the train to go home for the summer.

"Annie, I know what it feels like to be in love, believe me…I know what you're going through," Ginny said sighing heavily as she thought about her first crush, who was now standing in the kitchen doing something while he waited for her to come down and marry him.

Annie didn't talk to her mother for a moment as she pulled on her dress, zipped it up, and brushed her hair again. She was contemplating what her mother had told her. What was Ginny trying to tell her? You may get your crush in the end, but the end is actually twenty-years later and you may have a thirteen year old daughter together?

As Annie looked at herself in the mirror she found herself mentally going through a checklist of all the changes that had happened so far.

Cheekbones? Check.

Waist? Kind of.

Chest? Nope.

She sighed as she inspected herself and then turned to her mother who was currently struggling to get her shoes into her feet. '

"Stupid things," she muttered to herself. "I swear…"

"Mum?"

"Yes, dear?"

"What was I named after?"

"My favorite muggle movie," Ginny replied, putting on some more lip gloss. "It was one of the only regular muggle dates your father and I had. We went out to dinner at some nice little restaurant and I let slip I had never seen a…um, oh, right, a movie. So, he took me to go see one and the only one we could get tickets to was an older movie, it was about seven or eight years old at the time. And it was Annie, the story of an orphan girl being taken in by an older man."

"Sounds kind of creepy…," Annie said dryly.

"It was one of the best nights of my life," Ginny went on. "It was also the last time I would see Harry in almost eight years. Do you want to hear something else?"

"Sure," Annie replied.

"I got pregnant with you that night."

"Ugh, mum! Please!" Annie cried, shuddering. "I don't want to hear about that kind of stuff."

"Well, I wasn't going to go into detail," Ginny snapped.

"Oh…well, then. You got pregnant with me that night…," she began for Ginny who smiled at her through the mirror and placed her lip gloss down.

"Yes, I got pregnant and…oh, how frightened I was. I thought my entire life had just come crashing down upon me, I really had. I couldn't work up the courage to tell anyone, even your aunt Hermione who had just given birth to Mia." Ginny gave a laugh. "I stayed quiet about it for almost six months, until something went really wrong."

"What happened?" Annie asked.

"I was walking down the stairs with a clothes basket in my hand when one of the kids knocked into the back of my leg. I lost my balance and fell the rest of the way. Later on when I went to the bathroom I noticed blood and was so afraid that I had lost you. I didn't know it then, but I really needed you in my life. Harry had come back and I hadn't told him I was pregnant. He told me what his plans were and what he needed, I complied with them. But I wasn't happy.

"If I had lost you that night, I don't know what I would have done. See, Annie, my babe, you were an absolute miracle. The doctor said you were absolutely fine. He even told me that I was expecting a little girl, much to my delight."

"How did grandma take it?" Annie asked softly.

"Oh…erm, let's say not good…" Ginny replied vaguely.

"Did grandma and aunt Hermione know all along who the father was?"

"I think everyone did," Ginny replied. "No one said anything about it, though."

_Flashback_

"_Ginny, dear, Hermione told us you were in the hospital! Dear, whatever is the matter? You hadn't said anything to us at dinner!" Molly cried, barreling into the room and shooing a nurse out of the way, as she grabbed her daughter's hand. "Say something Ginny."_

"_I'm so sorry, mum," Ginny replied weakly. _

"_Oh, dear, don't be sorry at all! What is there to be sorry about? Just tell me what's wrong!" Molly looked close to tears as she surveyed Ginny's strained features. _

"_Mum…I got…," Ginny trailed off, looking to Hermione for comfort. She nodded firmly and grabbed her other hand, trying to add some warmth to Ginny. "Mum, I'm…Well, see…I kind of …erm, I don't know how to say this, really."_

"_Well just say it, darling, anything! Please tell mummy what's wrong!" Molly cried, close to hysterics. "Is it because Harry left? Oh, dear, I knew you weren't alright, even though you said you were. And you are putting on quite a bit of weight lately, don't think I don't notice! Sweetie, sometimes people just aren't meant to be together! I know it seemed as though things might work out, but you have to realize how much stress he is going through! I just wish you would get over him-"_

"_Mum, I'm pregnant!" Ginny bellowed, just as her brother's came in, along with their father. Molly stared at her for a moment as the entire hospital room went silent. Molly's bottom lip started to quiver and she nodded a few times before letting out a huge sob. _

"_Oh, h-how did th-this h-h-h-happen to my b-baby?" she moaned, placing her head on Ginny's arm. Ginny felt wet tears and tried herself to remain calm. "Oh, sweetie! How could you let this have happened? Why weren't you safe? Why were having…sex in the first place?"_

"_I'm sorry mum," Ginny whispered. "I don't know why. I was just so lonely and scared and confused and then he came back." She felt tears well up again. "He promised me he would stay…" She gave another sob herself and leaned back into the covers. "I thought he loved me."_

"_Ginny, he does love you!" Hermione cut in, looking horrorstruck. "You're all he ever talks about, really! When he was away from you he felt so horrible that he wouldn't speak to us for days! He loves you Ginny."_

"_Then why did he leave?" Ginny demanded. "Why would he do that to me? Again? Does he think I'm just going to wait for him forever?"_

"_Yes," Hermione replied softly. "He think you'll wait for him as long as he'd wait for you if you were in the same position."_

"_Ginny, dear, this is what we're going to do," Molly said firmly. "You are going to get an apartment near Ron and Hermione. You are going to get a job next year. I will be living with you for the first three months of the baby's life, and then, I will leave. You are going to get through this and everything is going to be alright."_

"_How do you know?" Ginny asked weakly._

"_I don't," Molly replied, "I just have to believe it will."_

_End of Flashback_

"Annie, dear, your father needs to see you downstairs," Molly said, coming into the room with a giant smile on her face. "Oh! Will you just LOOK at my darling daughter! I have never seen a more beautiful bride in my entire life….Although," she said suddenly and Ginny looked up, as though she expected an 'although' all along, "dear, should you be wearing white on your wedding day? I've heard of snickering, but people will be outright laughing at you!"

"It's crème, mother," Ginny replied, rolling her eyes. "Even I couldn't walk down the isle in a white dress. I mean, well, no. I couldn't."

Annie smiled at herself and walked down the stairs as people slowly began to gather around in the living room until they had to go outside. She quickly rushed past the Lupins, though she knew she needed desperately to talk to Marley. She side-stepped Professor McGonagall who was still angry about her protesting just before school let out.

As she stepped back into the kitchen she saw all of her red-headed uncles and walked through the kitchen, giving everyone a 'hello' and a smile. Walking into the library, she noticed Harry sitting in his chair by the window.

"Hey, dad," she said, closing the door over. "Did you want to see me?"

"Yes, yes I did," Harry said, standing up and walking over to the other side of the desk. "I am about to bestow upon you something that was given to me by your uncle George and uncle Fred." Internally Annie was thinking how much she did not want whatever that was in there. "It was my father's, however, from a very long time ago. He and his friends made it. They called themselves the Marauders. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs, my father. I actually think you know Moony."

"Oh?" Annie asked, curious.

"Yes, Remus," Harry said.

"Professor Lupin?" Annie cried.

"Yes, I know, my exact reaction when I found out," Harry said, smiling. "Well…anyways, this is a map. It will tell you where everyone is in the entire school. I think you'll find it very useful."

Annie hesitated before slowly taking the piece of paper from her father and looking down at it. Her eyes slowly ran over the battered edges and the worn look to it.

"It's just an old piece of paper-"

"Up-ba-bup," Harry said quickly. "This is NOT an old piece of paper." He looked personally harassed. "It happens that there is a password on it."

"Oh, how very James Bond of them," she said dryly. "What is the password?"

"It is pretty simple," Harry said, "'I solemly swear I'm up to no good.'"

"I solemly swear I'm up to no good," Annie repeated. Slowly the map started to unfold and ink began to appear. First from the corners as though it were fading in. Within a minute she was staring at a very detailed outline of Hogwarts. She saw Mrs. Norris, still kicking after all those years, slowly creeping down the hallways while Filch sat in his office. "Wow," she whispered.

"Yeah," Harry said. "Pretty cool, isn't it?"

"Cool?" Annie repeated. She had a look on her face Harry didn't like very much.

"Why do I have a feeling McGonagall is going to be seeing a lot more of you?"

"Because this was all I needed…," Annie replied, smirking. "Thanks, dad."

"Erm…right, well I guess you're welcome," Harry replied nervously. "Listen, please don't kill anyone or blow anything up. Alright?"

"No promises," Annie said just as a bell started going off. They both frowned at each other and went into the kitchen.

"Everyone start heading outside to the chairs! The wedding will begin momentarily!" Hermione was calling loudly, swinging a bell back and forth. "Annie? Annie? Where is Annie?"

"I'm here, auntie," Annie cried. She turned back to her father with a giant smile on her face. "I'll see you soon, dad."

"Yeah," Harry replied, looking quite nervous.

As Annie came back into her mother's room she felt another nervous twitch in her stomach. Her mother was sitting on her bed, glancing around the room.

"Annie, I'm getting married!" she cried the moment Annie walked into the room. "Married! Married! Married!"

"Mum, I get the picture," Annie replied. "You're happy about this, aren't you?"

"Of course I am! I wish I could have something to drink, to calm my nerves," Ginny muttered to herself, though Annie heard her.

"Want me to go get something from the bar?"

"No," Ginny replied, suddenly looking nervous again. "I can't have anything to drink."

"Why not-?" Annie broke off and turned to her mother wide-eyed. "Mum…are you? I mean, is there something that you want to tell me?"

"Annie…I'm pregnant!" Ginny cried. There was a moments silence and Ginny was worried Annie was going to get angry. However a moment later Annie let out a scream of delight and literally threw herself on top of her mother. They danced around the room for a moment, screaming and laughing.

"Oh, mum! How far along are you?"

"Three of four months," Ginny replied. "That's why we pushed up the wedding date."

"So dad knows, too?" Annie asked.

"Yes," Ginny replied. "Oh, Annie, are you excited?"

"Of course I am! I've always wanted siblings, mum! Do you know what it's going to be?"

"No," Ginny replied, shaking her head. "I don't care. I'm just so excited that everything is finally coming into place."

"C'mon, you two! Let's go!" Hermione snapped, coming into the room and looking angry and business like. "The wedding is about to start and unless you're there, it won't! Why're you two smiling like that?"

"Nerves," Annie replied easily, helping her mother up. Hermione dashed out of the room again, leaving Ginny and Annie alone. They looked at themselves in the mirror. "Look at the three of us. We're gorgeous."

Ginny placed a hand on her stomach and nodded. "Yes, we are."

**Seventeen Years Later**

"So, you see," Annie concluded. "That is how you came to be born." She turned to her younger sister, who was staring at her in shock.

"Mum and dad were already pregnant with me when they got married?" she asked. "Oh, God!"

"Don't worry about it," Annie replied.

"That's a good story, though. What happened with the others?"

"Well, first there was you. You came about five months after the wedding. Then there was Jude, he was about a year and four months after you. Then there was Stella and Max, about two years after that."

Annie looked at her sister, Violet, and smiled. "Mum and dad were so happy to have you."

"Guys, let's go! We're going to put decorations on the tree!" Jude Potter yelled, poking his head in.

"Yeah," Violet called back. "Well be right in."

Violet helped an eight-month pregnant Annie up and led her into the living room where everyone was decorating the tree. She looked at her younger sister, fourteen year old Stella who had long red hair and giant green eyes. Then there was Max who had black hair and green eyes. And finally Jude, at sixteen who had black hair and brown eyes. She let her eyes roam over them before settling on Annie.

Annie had a hand on her stomach, a giant, beaming smile on her glowing face. She watched her brother's and sisters, the ones she had wanted so much, place decorations on their tree. Annie felt a hand slide around her waist and smiled.

"Hey, Elliot," she said, turning to kiss her husband on the cheek.

"Hey," he replied. "Merry Christmas. Sorry I'm late."

"You're just on time," she whispered.

Annie then turned her attention to her parents who were busy throwing tinsel onto the tree. She couldn't help smiling everytime she saw them. The thought of them made her smile.

This morning as she came down to breakfast Violet asked to hear the story again. From the beginning. She wanted Annie to tell it to her, as she had done so many times before that. Annie gladly told her the story about how receiving her letter from Hogwarts changed her life…forever. It was fate, she decided, bringing her family together. It wasn't just a letter she had gotten, it was something more.

**The End.**

A/N Please read and review. Just in case anyone is wondering, this entire story was being told, by Annie, to Violet. Also, I am thinking of doing a One-Shot stemming from this story. I'm not sure. However, here we are.


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